Draw Me A Star
by thisisforyou
Summary: Intensely, dramatically COMPLETE! So there is such a thing as destiny... but how far do you take it when the whole world seems to be against you?
1. The First Meeting

**A/N: This is my first **_**Criminal Minds **_**fic and I've only just started watching. NZ is between seasons atm so what I've been watching is repeats. So far, this has nothing to do with any of them. A few of them are mentioned, but that's it. Enjoy – oh, and please review.**

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The library was quiet. Reid had known many types of quiet throughout his life, but the peaceful hush he always found in the library was his favorite. He stopped for a minute, watching an elderly woman reading a huge book propped against her knees because it was too heavy to hold up. He smiled as she looked up at him through thick glasses, and she smiled back. He extracted his own glasses from his satchel and moved down the racks of books.

The thing he liked most about this particular library was that the books were sorted by author, not genre; science fiction rubbed covers with romances without a care in the world. He wandered musingly down the shelves until he reached the 'S's. There he stopped, but he didn't know what he was looking for. It had been quiet at the office for longer than usual; perhaps a thriller to remind him what he worked for? Or… his hand strayed towards a sci-fi series, an old favorite. He hadn't read those in a while…

A teenage girl made her way down the aisle. Reid surrepticiously looked her up and down. She was looking for a certain volume, he could tell by her face and the speed of her gait. She walked proudly, her weight back, so he put her at reasonably well-off. She, too, wore a largish satchel, so she must have been well educated, too –

_Stop it, Reid_, he told himself firmly, lookingback at the shelf. _Stop analysing everyone you see. It's like a disease._ He kept his eyes fixed on the books.

"Snyder, Snyder…."

He looked up. "Maria V. Snyder?" He knew the library back to front and often helped people find the book they were looking for. She looked back at him, an interested smile on her pretty face.

"Yeah," she said, a note of surprise colouring her voice. He pointed.

"Which one?" he asked, stepping across the aisle to the right shelf. She joined him.

"Magic Study."

"The second one…" he plucked it from the shelf and held it out to her. She took it, but Reid found his hand lingering on it so that they both held separate ends of the book. He looked up, to find that her chocolate-brown eyes were studying his face.

"Thanks," she said. "Have you read them?"

"Yes," he replied brightly. "All three. Snyder's plot is –"

"Amazing," she finished, nodding. "It's like a roller coaster."

"Yeah," he agreed, "but her characters are a bit –"

"Lacking. Yeah. Valek especially annoyed the – I mean – I didn't like him." Reid nodded. There was something amiable about the girl, something warm and friendly that made him want to stay with her and keep talking about things that no-one else seemed able to talk about properly. She smiled at him awkwardly. He let go of the book and cursed himself for looking like a fool. "So, what are _you_ looking for?"

"A thriller." It popped out of his mouth before he knew that that was what he was going to say. She frowned thoughtfully.

"Have you read _Heartsick_, by Chelsea Cain?" He thought. If he had, he didn't remember. He'd read a lot of books.

"I don't think so."

"You'd remember if you had. Well, you have to! You have to go and get it now, you'll love it. And hate it. In a good way…" He smiled as she babbled on. His whole arm tingled as she grabbed his hand and pulled him down the aisle the way she had come. She took a red volume from a shelf and pushed it into his hands. He looked at it.

"Thanks. I'm Spencer, by the way," he said, knowing that it was rude of both of them not to have introduced thenselves before now. "Spencer Reid."

She laughed. "Oh, sorry," she said in an airy, carefree manner. She held out a hand. "Juliette Clearwater." He took her hand and shook it. After she had dropped it again he looked down at the book. "Make sure you start it early in the day, because you won't be able to put it down," she said lightly. "Or sleep. Gretchen is just… terrifying. She's the kind of serial killer I'd want to be."

Reid did a double-take. Did she mean what he thought she meant? "You… you _want_ to be –"

"Oh! That sounded really bad. I don't want to be a serial killer! I just find her fascinating. The way she always stayed five or so steps ahead of the police. She was so random, she had no type or anything, never left any traces…" she paused and looked at Reid shyly, sizing him up. He tried to look inviting; anything she wanted to say, he found himself wanting to hear. "That's what I want to do. You know, catch them. Like, behavioural stuff… profiling…"

A thrill ran through Reid. "Wait… you want to be a criminal profiler?" She nodded. He frowned. She was embarrassed – why would she be embarrassed? "Oh my gosh – that's what I do!" he said. She looked up, her eyes wide. He grinned. "I work in the Behavioural Analysis Unit of the FBI. Catching serial killers and terrorist threats and stuff." They laughed together.

"Wow," she said, looking at him so intensely that he felt as though he were about to melt. "That's so… I'm so jealous! That's, like, my _dream_ job. Do you like it?"

He nodded enthusiastically. "I love it. It's so exciting, every day is different, and the rest of the team is just… they're all great." An inkling of an idea came to him. "Have you finished school?" he asked her. She blushed.

"Yeah," she said. "Last term."

"Are you… do you think you're any good? At profiling? And behavioural analysis?" She nodded happily.

"I can always tell when people are lying, or hiding something. I –" He smiled to himself. Her voice had regained that burbling, excited note again. He cut her off.

"Do you think you can prove it?" She looked around thoughtfully, then grinned and pointed at the elderly woman Reid had smiled at.

"That woman," she said, "do you think she's enjoying her book?"

Reid looked at the woman, bent over the huge book. A slight frown creased her forehead. "No."

"Why not?"

"Her micro-expression –see, it's a frown of disgust. Her finger is tapping on the page – that shows irritation." The woman turned a page. "Did you see that? That was harder than necessary. Maybe the language isn't very good, and it's annoying her. Something is." He looked back at her, pleased with his assessment. She was smiling – smug! "What?"

"Nothing," she said softly, teasing. "That was very good. Wrong, but very good."

"Wrong!" he repeated, incensed. "You, an eighteen year-old high school graduate, are telling me, a professional FBI analyst, that I'm wrong?"

She giggled. "Yes. And I'm seventeen – eighteen in two weeks."

"Even worse!"

"All right! But look – if it were something immediately affecting her, it would be more than a micro-expression, wouldn't it? And she's more than halfway through it. If it was annoying her, don't you think she would have stopped by now? It's a big book, obviously a hassle for her to read."

"Not if it was… like Snyder. Good plot, but terrible characters, or something like that. And _your_ explanation doesn't cover her hands." Satisfied, Reid watched her face. To his surprise, she was still smiling.

"I think that what's annoying her, disgusting her, is a character inside the book. Like, someone just raped someone, or somehting." She stared at the woman for a few seconds. "Well," she said finally, "let's find out. What are we betting? Your job? If I win, I obviously deserve it more than you do."

An unusually bold sensation crept over Reid. He laughed. "Coffee?" he offered.

"What, if you win, I'll buy you coffee, and if I win, you'll buy me one?" An amused smile played with the corner of her mouth. He agreed, holding his breath, hoping…

"It's not as good as your job, but… okay." And she was off, bouncing over to the woman and sitting down next to her. "Good book?"

Reid crept closer as the woman looked up in surprise. "Yes, it _is,_ thank you, dear," she said. Reid's heart sank. He flopped down onto the vacant seat on Juliette's other side as she shot him a self-satisfied smile. "This man is such an asshole, though," the woman continued conversationally. "It's disgusting." Reid scowled. This girl had been right, and _he_, Spencer Reid, the genius, probably, modesty aside, Hotch's top analyst, had been wrong. He wasn't wrong often, and he didn't like it. Juliette patted him softly on the knee.

"Bad luck, Spencer. Don't tell your boss." She turned back to the old woman. "Thank you," she said, standing up. The woman followed her with her eyes, confused.

"Thank you? For what?"

"You just won me a free coffee." She looked back at him, her dark eyes glittering. "Coming?"

"No," he said grumpily, but of course, he was. She laughed, and pulled him out of the couch.

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The coffee shop was quiet; not silent, but compared to the busy street outside, what noise there was seemed subdued somehow, covered in a blanket of hush. Contentment radiated from the shope, people chatting happily over coffee.

Juliette sat down at a table by the window. He followed and sat down opposite her. She watched as he took off his glasses and replaced them next to her book in his satchel.

"So," she said expectantly, "tell me about your job."

"What do you want to hear?"

"The… strangest case you ever had."

He thought for a minute. "There was one –"

"What can I help you two with today?" A chubby waitress squeezed into a too-tight skirt stood pompously in front of them.

"Ah, yes," Reid stuttered surprisedly, "yes – I'll have a tall cinnamon cappuchino, please. And …" he glanced at Juliette.

"A small mocha, thanks."

"You don't have to get a small, if you don't want to," he said, hating the slightly anxious note in his voice.

"I know," she replied coolly, "but you don't want to see what too much coffee does to me." He laughed. "So, anyway," she continued, "there was one…"

"Oh. Yes; have you read the novel _Empty Planet_?"

"Um… the one with the robots? And Allegro? Yes, it was really good! Why?"

"Well, there was this guy once who thought that the book was written for him. He thought he was Allegro. He was blowing all these buildings up because he thought that he was doing what the author – his mother – wanted him to… he nearly killed her before she convinced him that he wasn't actually her son."

"That's weird. I suppose the case was solved because you'd read _Empty Planet_ and knew exactly what he meant when he called himself Allegro, or something?"

"Something like that." He shared a knowing grin with her. They sat in silence for a while. "I was kidnapped once. That was… well, terrifying, really. That was another weird case. The guy had a split personality. It hit me kind of hard, I guess. I thought I was too good for that, you know?"

She nodded thoughtfully. "I guess it would be kind of electrifying, though, too," she remarked. He frowned. He'd never thought of it like that, but he supposed it was, really.

"Yeah, kind of. Not as electrifying as the chase, though. Like, chasing the killers. Tracking them down. When you know what you're doing, you know you're faster than them…" her eyes lit up with some sort of spark.

"Yes! That's what I want to do most, I suppose. It just seems so cool, to use my useless skills in somehting that actually helps people. "

He smiled at her. She was reminding him so much of himself before he was accepted into the BAU. It had seemed like an amazing but unreachable dream –

His phone rang. He apologised to Juliette, who just waved at him to answer it. He glanced at the screen. _Incoming Call, Agent Hotchner._ He grimaced.

"Hotch?"

"Reid, something's come up. I need you here. Asap." Disappointment cascaded into Reid's stomach. He would have to leave Juliette without a backwards glance. Her and her dreams that seemed to mirror his own… an idea popped into his head, as ideas often did.

"I'll be there. Uh, Hotch?" Hotch grunted. Reid turned away from Juliette, sitting calmly opposite him, and lowered his voice. "Can I… bring somebody? A… a girl?"

"This is an urgent case, Reid. We don't have time for you to bring your girlfriend." Disapporval dripped from Hotch's impatient voice.

"She's only seventeen, Hotch, not my girlfriend," he hissed into the phone, glancing up at her. Although he was sure she couldn't hear exactly what he was sayong, she surpressed a laugh.

"That's even worse, what the hell do you want to bring her for, a school trip?"

"She wants to join the BAU. She's pretty good –" he paused embarrassedly, "-she proved me wrong." There was a long pause on the other end of the phone, so long that Reid thought Hotch had hung up. Their coffee arrived in the pause. He pushed his wallet across the table at Juliette, smiling at the mock-glee that crossed her face. Then there was a click, and Hotch's voice sounded again.

"All right, Reid. You'd better be right about her."

"Yes, sir." He hung up the phone and looked up at Juliette. She was toying with his wallet in her fingers teasingly.

"You have to go, don't you," she asid, a hollow, empty smile on her face. "It was great to meet you."

"You too," he said, standing up and slinging his satchel over one shoulder. He picked up the styrofoam cup of coffee. "Come on."

She blinked. "Sorry? Wh – where are we going?"

He grinned at her. "I've got you a case."

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**A/N: So, there it is.**

**I can leave it like this, if you like. Or, if I get at least 5 reviews telling me I should continue it, I will. I have some interesting ideas for other chapters. It'll have to wait until I've finished my current chapter fic, so I warn you, it won't be soon, but it will come, if you want it. I hate to blackmail you, but nothing else seems to make people review. Please, please, PLEASE, even if you didn't like it, review it. Constructive critisism is, in my opinion, even better than praise (although I love that too) and way better than nothing at all. **

**But, yeah. Reid/Prentiss or Reid/Juliette? I'm still not sure, so your opinions will be counted. Any ideas are also welcome! Should I use a case from an existing episode (I'll have to tape one – I'm just watching the repeats that are playing on TV and I don't know what season it is or anything) or should I make up my own? If I do, someone will probably be kidnapped/injured. Or something. **

**Just so as you know, working in the BAU **_**would**_** be my dream job so any advice on how I could get there would be awesome too! Love you!**

**-for you!**


	2. Schoolgirl

**A/N: Perspective change? Just experimenting. Show of opinions would be nice when you all review… 'cause you will, won't you? Oh, and sorry if I've turned Prentiss into a bit of a baddie. It wasn't intentional at first, then I thought heck, let's run with it. Maybe that's just how Juju sees her. The inspiration from this chapter came from the book I mentioned in the last one, **_**Heartsick**_** by Chelsea Cain. Did I mention that Gretchen is amazing? I did? Ok.

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The office was quiet when we walked in. I usually can't stand quiet, but sometimes you have comfortable silences and those aren't so bad. This wasn't one of them. Five people were littered around the room, typing on computers, chatting to each other or, in the case of a young dark-skinned man, pacing fitfully and spewing out details at every turn. As soon as Spencer and I walked in, however, this all stopped. Every occupant of the room turned to look at us, with varying expressions on their faces; confusion on the pacer's and a harassed-looking older man's, a uncertain but welcoming smile on a young blond woman's, irritation on an even older, balding man and, to my surprise, open hostility on a bold brunette woman's.

The harassed-looking man sighed. "Reid, who's this?" I glanced at Spencer. He was frowning.

"What? Hotch, you said I could bring her –"

"Oh, I did too. Hello," he said, then promptly turned away from me. I tried a half-hearted response, but Hotch wasn't listening any more. A little disconcerted, I turned back to Spencer. He smiled reassuringly. I suddenly felt like a little child, the way they were all treating me.

"Guys, this is Juliette Clearwater. She's going to try and help with the case. Juliette, this is Derek Morgan," the pacer raised a hand in an odd kind of salute. "…Jason Gideon – he's in charge here," The balding man nodded and mumbled out a hello before turning back to his pile of papers spread lavishly over a desk. "Hotch – um, agent Aaron Hotchner, sorry," Hotch didn't respond at all, "Jennifer Jareau –"

"JJ," the blond woman interrupted. I smiled; she seemed friendly enough. "Hi. Hope you can help, it's mad here."

"-and Emily Prentiss," Spencer finished. The brunette barely glanced at me before addressing Spencer.

"Reid, why'd you bring a schoolgirl? Especially now! You know how serious this case is! She's just going to get in the way!"

"No, I think she can help," Spencer defended, apparently not noticing the hostility I heard in her voice. "And I have no idea how serious this case is, I haven't been filled in yet." Jason Gideon raised his head.

"Reid, Clearwater," he said, and I thought his voice had a distinctly calming quality to it. "Over here." I glanced at Spencer, who made a sweeping gesture towards Gideon.

"Ladies first," he said, a slightly teasing note to his voice. I obeyed.

"You mean schoolgirls first," I said, trying to keep the bitterness out of my voice. He grinned. Gideon sat down behind the desk as we approached, a tired expression momentarily gaining control of his face. I suddenly realized. Whatever I'd walked into the middle of, it was big. Bigger than what the BAU usually dealt with. I wondered if I'd made a mistake. As we reached the table, the tired expression sunk beneath the surface and Gideon looked up at me.

"I'm not saying I approve of your being here," he threw an I'll-talk-to-you-later look at Spencer, "but JJ's right. We need all the help we can get here and if Reid thought you could handle this…" he grinned. "So. We've had three victims in the last week, completely random, no pattern so far –"

"Gideon?" Reid interrupted politely. "How do you know they're all the same killer?" Gideon looked at him scathingly. He dug around in the pile of papers in his desk and slapped three photos in front of us. I gasped.

Each photo told the same story. An adult victim, two men and a woman, lay face down on concrete surfaces. The right arm was missing from the bodies and one of the women, whose black hair had been cropped short. The other woman, a shock of blond curly hair splayed out like an angel's halo around her head, was missing the left arm. All three victims had been stripped down to their underwear, but their backs appeared relatively unharmed – except that on their right hip-bones, an eight-pointed star had been gouged deftly with some kind of knife.

I traced the star with a fingertip. They drew stars the way I did, the way shown in that children's book. What was it called? _I Saw A Star?_ No, that wasn't right…

"_Draw Me A Star,"_ I mumbled to myself. Both Gideon and Spencer turned to look at me.

"What was that?" Spencer asked.

"Oh, nothing," I deflected quickly. Then I paused. I couldn't help remembering something I'd read in another book, once. _Everything is relevant. All the facts count._ "Just – they learnt to draw stars the same way I did. From an Eric Carle book called _Draw Me A Star_". I repeated the rhyme to them as I traced the shape again. "Down, over, left and right, draw a star, oh-so bright." I looked up. "I've only ever met one other person who draws stars like that. Hardly anyone even knows that the book exists."

Gideon looked at me until I began to feel intimidated. I couldn't help liking the older man, even though he didn't seem to like me. At least he didn't openly hate me, like Emily Prentiss seemed to. Finally he smiled wanly. "Thanks, but we can't realistically ask every member of the public to _draw us a star_." He grinned at the emphasis he had put on the last phrase.

"And even if we could, he'd probably draw it another way anyway," Spencer chipped in. Gideon's head briefly moved in assent.

"So Clearwater, what can we learn about the killer from the way they draw stars?" Gideon asked. My heart gave a loud thump. He was asking me – testing me. At least, I thought faintly, this meant he was willing to give me a chance. I looked back at the pictures.

"He – or she," I began, giving Spencer a look, which he wisely ignored, "probably had a reasonably good childhood, good enough to have plenty of books at their disposal. They probably had parents that were around a lot, so that they had time to teach our killer how to draw like the book says." Gideon nodded.

"Right – good work – so that means we're not dealing with a revenge killer, like I thought. So we're back to the beginning." He massaged his head with his hands.

I spared a sympathetic smile in his direction. The poor man. He had a generally careworn face, lined and tired, with bags under his eyes. I imagined that he looked more or less like this all of the time, and his long night hunting this new killer had merely accentuated the creases on his kind face. A certain warmth radiated from him, a kind of friendliness… "What do you mean by revenge killer, sir?"

It was Spencer that answered, as though he couldn't stop himself. "A revenge killer is usually someone who had a rough childhood and has a built-in hatred of humankind. Usually a specific class of humankind, like people who share an occupation with their parents or foster parents, but not always. I would have placed this guy as a revenge killer too. Only two kinds of killer choose victims with this much diversity." I raised my eyebrows, indicating that he should go on. "Revenge killers and psychopaths. Psychopaths are far more dangerous, but this guy doesn't seem to defile the body as much as most… I suppose that's a good thing."

"Doesn't it mean that each new victim dies faster, giving is less time and more victims before we can solve it?" I asked, not sure myself whether I was teasing him.

"Did you learn _everything _you know about behavioral analysis from television?" he asked scathingly. I shrugged cheerfully. He grinned. "Usually, actually, it does." I opened my mouth to say something else, but, embarrassingly, my phone rang. A curse suppressed it.

"Sorry," I said hurriedly, pressing my hand against my jeans pocket to dull the noise, but to no avail; my caller ID ringtone, Queen's _Killer Queen_, rang out loudly across the large office. Charisse, my sometimes-disturbingly-paranoid-and-other-times-freakishly-Zen-ed-out flatmate.

"It'll be my flatmate – can I take it? She might have flooded the house again." Gideon nodded without taking his head off his hands, and I finally felt Prentiss' eyes leave my back as I turned away from Spencer and Gideon to take the call. With difficulty, I extracted my phone from my pocket.

"Charisse? Bad time, honey." I hissed into the phone. Her soft voice whispered back.

"Juju? Where are you? I haven't seen you in ages, you said you'd be back by ten…" I shook my head at her paranoia. Sometimes, she wouldn't even notice I was there, but when I'd rather not be disturbed…

"I'm at the BAU, Char," I said urgently. I loved Charisse dearly, but she could be a little clingy. "Working on a case!" I couldn't keep the excitement out of my voice. "Trying to catch a killer."

"A _serial_ killer?" Panic flooded the words. A smile crept over my face.

"Yes, Char. But it's okay, the BAU's onto whoever they are, and they're pretty good." There was silence for a few seconds and I thought I could hear Charisse employing her yoga principles of "deep breathing" to calm herself down.

"Will you be in for dinner?" she asked finally. I thought for a while.

"I dunno, Char. I'll text you."

"Okay. Have fun."

"I will. Bye, honey." I replied, and hung up. The office was oddly silent for a moment.

"You're seventeen and you're flatting?" Spencer asked interestedly. I looked around at the rest of them. They all looked away quickly and pretended to be busy.

"Yeah," I said, feeling horribly self-conscious. "My mum died of Wilson's disease when I was nine, and… my father hates me, so the minute I turned seventeen I followed in my brother's footsteps and moved out." I looked around again. The same thing happened; so, they didn't want me there, but they were interested in my background? "Everyone okay with that?" I said loudly. Gideon looked up at them.

"So, how many times has Charisse flooded your apartment?" Spencer asked, trying to relieve the tension, a tinge of mirth in his voice.

"Three, I think. She's a bit… vacant. She's a yoga instructor." He laughed.

"And… what's Wilson's Disease?" If you don't mind…"

"No, I don't," I said. "It's kind of like schizophrenia." For some reason, Spencer's face blanched and I saw the first shadows of tears build up behind his eyes. "What?"

"Nothing," he said shortly, "just – my mother died of schizophrenia."

Usually, when someone says something like that to me I rush to comfort them. But I already knew Spencer didn't like to show emotion, so he definitely wouldn't want me hugging him like I wanted to at that moment. So I was momentarily unsure what to do as I looked into his soft eyes. He had a very soft, vulnerable face. It was obvious that his mother's death still bothered him, at least slightly. It was also obvious that he didn't want anybody at the office to see that. He must have a lot of respect for them all. So I just stood there for a moment before I collected myself. "Sorry," I said, smiling sadly. He shrugged and turned back to Gideon. I followed suit. The older man pulled his head up out of his hands as though, had he left it there any longer, it would have stuck. The poor guy was probably almost asleep.

"Right. JJ, would you brief Reid on the situation further?" JJ stood up and hurried over to us, smiling. She seemed like a happy sort of person. I looked awkwardly back at Gideon.

"And… me, sir?" He gazed at me for a few seconds as if he'd forgotten I was there.

"Yes," he said finally. "You go too." I nodded, trying to shake off the awkwardness of the moment. I wasn't usually one to be cowed by an awkward moment. I was usually the one who jumped in with a new conversation starter, but somehow I didn't think that bringing up the latest _Harry Potter_ movie would work here. I followed JJ and Spencer in silence as the pretty blonde led us into what was obviously a briefing room.

"Don't mind Gideon," she said to me kindly, "he's just tired. He was here all night."

I smiled back. "It's not him I mind so much. He doesn't hate me fro being here."

"Neither do I," she sad surprisedly, "I have enormous respect for Dr. Reid and if he says you're worth it, you're worth it." She extended a hand. "Welcome aboard."

I took the hand and shook it firmly. "Thank you," I said earnestly.

"You're welcome. Now," she turned away from me and picked up a remote from the table. Spencer pulled out a chair and sat down. After a moment's hesitation, so did I. JJ pressed a button on the remote and a screen behind her lit up with the pictures of the three victims again.

"We've got three victims in a week, all in this area; absolutely no connection between them other than that. All three bodies were dumped in exactly the same spot and found at around ten a.m. We called you in right after the third one – here." She pushed another button and a map appeared, sporting a pulsing red dot on a tiny alleyway. "No-one saw anything to do with the drop at any time." She looked up at us then, another touch of the remote bringing up close-ups of the missing arms. "The veins have been singed closed to stop the bleeding. I don't have any pictures of the front of the bodies, but it isn't pretty. This guy loves torture. I'm guessing the arm was cut off bit by bit, finger by finger. They weren't dumped with the bodies. These two victims," she brought up mug shots of the man and the dark-haired woman, "are missing their right arms, but this woman," a mug shot of the other victim came up, "was missing her left. Records show she was left handed. The arm was chosen for maximum pain."

I glanced at Spencer. He had put his glasses on again, the typical 'geek glasses' with the thick black frames across the top and no frames around the bottoms. They suited him, just like the satchel and the geeky but casual shirt-tie-and-knitted-vest outfit he was wearing did. I found myself smiling. He was a class-A geek. I'd always had a bit of a soft spot for geeks. He looked up at JJ. "Do you have backgrounds for the victims?" he asked, gazing at her intently. "_Anything_ that might help us find a pattern?" The expression on his face was almost comical, quite glazed-over, deep in thought.

"We have for the first two," JJ tossed him two files of paper, "and the third woman IDed as Stephanie Palmer. Garcia was doing a background check, she's probably got it now." He nodded slowly, flicking through the files. I caught glimpses of names on the files: Rebecca Green and Jacob Montgomery.

"So, if this person," I hesitated to say 'guy' like they'd been doing, "singed shut the arteries, they must have some previous medical experience to manage that."

"Yes," said JJ, "and the autopsies showed traces of morphine in their blood."

"Does that narrow down possible careers?" I asked. "Not just anyone can get morphine, can they?"

"Probably," Spencer said, again sounding like he couldn't stop himself supplying information. "It could be the killer getting it, or it could be someone they know, or it could be an illegal supplier. There's bound to be a few of them. We can ask the hospital if any of their doctors are using large amounts of morphine –"

"We already have," JJ interrupted. "They said no-one was using more than usual, but they'd keep an eye on it." Spencer's eyes narrowed critically. That looked like an extreme thinking face. I suppressed a giggle. This wasn't the time to go all girly and laugh at Spencer's thinking face.

"That's all we've got," JJ admitted. "This guy's good. Doesn't leave anything behind. We should go and see what Penelope's pulled up on Stephanie Palmer."

I didn't know who Penelope was, but I assumed that she and 'Garcia' JJ had mentioned before were the same person. I also gathered that I'd meet her soon. Spencer abruptly closed the folders and tapped the bottoms of them against the table to neaten the pile. He tucked them under his arm as he stood up. This time, I was a step ahead of him, already at the room's official-looking glass door.

Derek Morgan had stopped pacing and Gideon had taken up the job instead, thinking aloud to no-one in particular. Hotchner had left the room. There was no sign of Penelope Garcia, but Morgan was hunched over a computer with paper sliding neatly out of a printer next to him. I found myself thinking about the difference between that printer and mine; this one was neatly and efficiently dropping paper into a tidy pile. Mine spewed pages in all directions and started printing at random places on the page. Was that a hint? A metaphor for a comparison between me and everyone else there? They were all professionals, sleek and efficient. Did I, an untrained 17 year-old straight from high school, seem as out of place here as my rickety old printer would?

"So," Spencer said quietly to me as we moved towards the equally official-looking glass door to the office, 'this killer. What do you think? He has some medical knowledge, access to morphine supplies, a decent childhood, and a love of torture and pain. Go."

I gave him a look. "Why do you keep saying 'he'? Or 'this guy'? How do you know it's a guy?"

He frowned. "You're right, I guess. It's just that most serial killers are male."

I grinned coquettishly. "That doesn't mean they all are," I mock-scolded him. "In fact, I think this one is female." I pulled the door open. He missed a step and had to hurry to keep up with me.

"Why?" he asked, almost indignantly.

"Because it's too delicate. Look at the star. What _guy_ would painstakingly carve an eight-pointed star on a corpse? A guy who wanted an obvious signature would just remove the same rib-bone or something." Spencer and JJ exchanged a look. "What?"

"Nothing," Spencer said quickly, "just we had a case not too long ago where the killer used the exact same signature. He was… well, don't mention him to Gideon." I decided I didn't ask. "Fair enough, though, what you're saying makes sense." I nodded.

"You should say that t Gideon," JJ said. I smiled thankfully.

"And also… I don't see how we can rule out revenge killing at this point. Maybe both parents died or something, There are other reasons people seek revenge than just a neglected childhood." I flinched, expecting him to laugh and tell me I was wrong.

"Yes, I agree – but, if he – sorry, _they_" he corrected himself quickly, "tortured the victims first, like JJ said, they're more likely to be doing this because they like it."

"Or they like revenge. Or attention – JJ, has this been all over the news or are they keeping it quiet?"

"I think they're keeping it quiet, in case it is attention they're looking for," she replied.

"Doesn't that just make them do it worse?"

"Or," Spencer said, gripping my arm softly and steering me towards Morgan, "it makes them send a demand to the press, giving us a new lead."

"Oh." We stopped in front of the printer.

"Is this Palmer's profile?" Spencer asked. Morgan looked up.

"Yeah. Garcia couldn't find anything that links the three victims except their place of residence." He reached out and shuffled the papers out of the printer tray. "It looks like the guy just sat on the street and bumped off the first person he saw."

"Actually, Morgan, we think we may be dealing with a woman," Spencer said, a little smugly considering the breakthrough wasn't his. Morgan raised his eyebrows.

"A woman?" I looked around at the voice. Prentiss had joined us. "Why?" Gideon looked up at her raised tones, and came over too.

"Because its very delicate. The signature, the star – it's too feminine… how did you put it, Juliette?" Spencer turned to me.

"This was her idea? And you're just taking it? Just like that? We've never had a female serial killer before. It just doesn't happen. She's just a kid, she doesn't know that." Prentiss sounded outraged, as though my word had been chosen over hers.

"If it's a good idea, Emily, we run with it, no matter where it comes from. You've never had a problem with that before. You have to admit, it makes sense," Spencer defended.

"I agree with Clearwater, actually," Gideon said, as if he was insanely surprised by the fact. "A man wouldn't carve an intricate star on the bodies like that. Just because it hasn't happened in your time here, Prentiss, doesn't mean it's impossible."

"Thank you, sir," I said quietly. Prentiss scowled.

Gideon shrugged. "Like Dr. Reid said, if it's a good idea, we run with it. But really, knowing the sex of the un-sub doesn't help that much."

"Actually, sir, I also think we're still dealing with a revenge killer. This is too quick for someone who really enjoys causing pain." Spencer talked quite quickly when he was talking to his superiors, I noticed, as though they needed the information as fast as possible. Gideon nodded, slower this time. The sound of the glass door opening and closing made him turn and look as Hotchner – Hotch, Spencer had called him – entered the room, rubbing his eyes with one hand.

"The press aren't happy about keeping this quiet," he said to the room in general. "Reid, tell me you've got something we can work with."

"Ah, well, we think the un-sub is female," Spencer said quickly, "and we're considering revenge on mankind in general as a motive, but other than that, sir, the un-sub doesn't leave us much."

"Yes, I see that," Hotch said dryly. Dry humor didn't really suit him. "Who decided it was a woman?"

"Clearwater did, sir." I snapped my head around to look at Prentiss, who had spoken. She was staring at me, her expression oddly unreadable. I smiled at her; she didn't return it.

"Really, Clearwater?" Hotch's face bore a frown, but then, he'd been frowning the whole time. I wondered briefly whether he ever smiled. I nodded solemnly.

"Yes, sir. I just don't think the star is very masculine." He seemed to think about this for a few seconds.

"Okay. Well done." I nodded again. "Morgan, has Garcia sent Stephanie Palmer's background check through?" Morgan nodded and passed him the papers. Hotch flicked through them. "Reid, take Clearwater to the drop spot an then to Palmer's husband. According to this, he should be home."

* * *

"Reid." The voice that called his name was Morgan's; he stopped, told Juliette to wait, and turned around. Morgan ushered him into the corridor, out of earshot. He looked expectantly into the taller man's dark eyes. "Reid, what are you doing?"

"What do you mean?" he asked, though he knew. Of course he knew.

"With Juliette. What are you doing? Where did you find her, anyway?" He looked steadily at Morgan, who was leaning casually against the wall. He, in turn, shoved his hands in to his pockets.

"The library."

There was a pause as Morgan looked at him incredulously. Then he snorted. "What?" Reid asked indignantly. His friend was laughing freely now. "_What?_"

"The library?" Reid laughed with him, but he didn't quite know what he was laughing at. "Reid, you don't have some fairytale romance in mind, do you?"

Reid widened his eyes innocently to illustrate his shock. "_Romance?_ Morgan, she's _seventeen,"_ he said, gesturing at the wall. "She reminds me of myself when I was that age. I just wanted to give her a chance to prove herself, that's all." He saw Morgan raise an eyebrow. "What? You think I did the wrong thing? You don't think I should have brought her?"

"I think that you bringing her has somehow offended Prentiss, and that's not good. I think… any other case would have been okay. But this is a big one and she could just get in the way." Reid's heart sank. He couldn't just send her away, could he?

"Was the un-sub being a woman really her idea?" Morgan asked. Reid nodded.

"I have to admit I hadn't even considered the possibility," he said sheepishly, "but when you do, it makes sense." Now it was Morgan's turn to nod.

"You just have to convince Prentiss that she's worth keeping," he said, grinning. "I think you impressed Hotch with that one, and Gideon's too tired to care. JJ couldn't not like someone if she tried, not that she ever will. Garcia hasn't met her yet, but I can't imagine her not being sunny and cheerful." He grinned, as though the mere thought of Penelope Garcia cheered him up considerably. Reid smiled at this.

"Yeah. Can we go now?" He asked cheekily. Morgan laughed softly and opened the door again. Juliette gave the two of them a conspiratorial grin.

"Secret conversation over?" she teased. "You can do your job now?"

And they left together.

* * *

**A/N: Okay, I'm not going to demand 5 reviews this time. All I'm going to say is that people who read and don't review, especially if they ****find faults, disgust me. That's right, I'm talking to you guys out there. You disgust me. Oh, and also, the more reviews I get, the more I want to carry on, so the faster I update. Opinions on perspectives, the case, the new title, whether I should add in some Reid/Prentiss (I've opted against Reid/Juliette at this stage) and any constructive criticism would be much appreciated! I've also given up on the quiet thing, I think. But I'm not sure, I might pick it up later. Anywho, for now, and it may be a while because this is my last week for a while with access to a computer, TTFN!**

**-for you!**


	3. Breakup revenge

Mr. Palmer was a quiet man, though I guessed he wasn't always like that. His face was pale and drawn, a usually sallow complexion completely drained of any colour. I bit my lip as he invited us to sit down on his cushy leather sofa. "I'm sorry, Mr. Palmer," Spencer said quietly. The man nodded, but said nothing. "We just need to ask you a few questions that might help us to find whoever did this before they do it again." Mr. Palmer swallowed audibly, but again, made no verbal response. Spencer drew in a long breath.

"Do you know anyone who may have been angry or upset with Stephanie? Maybe somebody she worked with?" he asked tentatively. Palmer shook his head, and, finally, in a hoarse, croaky voice, spoke.

"Everybody loved Stephie. She was always so happy and friendly and kind…" his face crumpled and he buried it in his hands as he began to sob. "I don't understand why anyone would do this to her," he wailed.

"We don't think it was personal, at this point," Spencer said factually. He looked sympathetic enough, but I didn't think he knew how to talk it too. "That's what we're trying to find out – do you think that anybody might have been jealous that everybody loved her? Do you know of anyone that held some kind of power that might have favored Stephanie above someone else?"

He shook his head again. "She always made sure everyone was treated equally at the office," he said quietly. "She had no truck with people who had favorites." Tears were flowing freely down his face now. My heart wrenched; I wanted to go and comfort him, but sensed that it wouldn't go down well with either of the two men in the room.

"Do the names Rebecca Green and Jacob Montgomery mean anything to you?" Spencer asked, leaning forwards.

Mr. Palmer looked up. "_Jake_ Montgomery?" An unexpected thrill shot through me; I decided, for the umpteenth time (and at least the third that day), that I loved this job.

"Did you know him?" I asked, mimicking Spencer's posture unconsciously.

"Stephie did. They used to be engaged, but it didn't work out because of something to do with his family… wait, why do you say _did_ I know him?"

"He died at the same hands as Stephanie," Spencer said quietly. "Can you tell us exactly what the family troubles were?" Mr. Palmer paled at the news of Montgomery's death, but shook his head.

"I don't know," he replied. "Stephie just used to say that his family was against the marriage and he loved them more than he loved her. I always used to say, lucky me." Another tear slipped down his cheek.

"Thank you very much for talking to us, Mr. Palmer," Spencer said, standing up. "Once again, I'm sorry for your loss."

"Sorry won't bring her back," the man whispered hoarsely, opening the front door.

"No, it won't," I mused sadly, more to myself than to him.

"Good luck," he said as he shut the door in our faces. Spencer took the stairs leading up to the front door two at a time and pulled out his phone.

"We need the address of Montgomery's closest family," he said.

"Try to find out if he had a girlfriend when he died, too," I added, skipping down the stairs after him.

"That's probably not going to be on record unless they were married," he said, "and I don't think a current girlfriend is what we're looking for. He probably just broke up with her and suggested it was because he wasn't over an ex, or he'd met someone from his past…"

"How would the unsub track down all of his exes if we can't?" I asked.

"He probably talked about them. Chances are he only talked about two or three of them."

"Green and Palmer," I supplied. He nodded. "So are you saying we could have seen the end of this?"

"It's possible, but we can't afford to take that chance," he replied. He brought the phone up to his ear. "Garcia? Yeah, I need the addresses for Jacob Montgomery's closest family. We may have a connection." He smiled at something the person at the other end was saying. "Yeah. Would it be possible to find out if he had a girlfriend recently, too?" He paused, his face screwed up in painful anticipation. "No? Okay. No, we'll just have to find out from his family, then. Yeah… okay. Thanks, Garcia." He hung up the phone.

"No-go on the girlfriend, then?" I said. He shook his head.

"I'm just letting Hotch know where we're going – we won't be able to walk to the Montgomerys'." The phone went back up to his ear. "Hotch? It's Reid. Yeah. We've found out that Palmer was Montgomery's ex-fiancée. We think it could be a break-up revenge spree, which explains the speed – maybe Montgomery told the unsub that he wasn't over – yes. Garcia just gave us Montgomery's sister's address. It's a bi further away… sorry, sir? Of-of course. We'll be twenty minutes." I looked at him expectantly as the phone came down again. "He wants JJ to go with us. We're going back to the office."

"Sorry," I said quietly. "He wants her there to watch me."

"Well, JJ has trouble with disliking people, so I think you'll be okay," he replied easily, starting back towards the bureau building.

* * *

Shelley Montgomery was blonde and curvy, wearing a thick layer of foundation a shade darker than her skin, leaving a distinct orange line on her jawbone, cherry-red lipstick and so much mascara it was incredible she could lift her eyelids. She looked Spencer up and down as she opened the door. JJ and I exchanged looks when she spotted his FBI badge. "FBI?" she said in a thick Texan accent. I tried not to grimace.

"Shelley Montgomery?" Spencer asked. She nodded. "We need to ask you some questions about your brother."

She pouted her fish-like lips in what she obviously thought was a sexy manner. "Lucky you," she purred, leaning on the doorframe and angling her body towards him. "FBI agent… that's sexy. You single?" I tried not to laugh at the look of terror on Spencer's face. JJ rolled her brilliant blue eyes at me.

"He's _busy. _Can we come in, please?"She asked, a little impatiently. Shelley looked at her from bottom to top, slowly, pouted again and flounced off, leaving the door open. I looked at Spencer and finally allowed myself a short laugh.

"I'm sorry," I said, sobering up as he glared at me and we stepped into Shelley's flat, "the look on your face…"

"Yeah, Reid, how is it that you still don't have a girlfriend when every prostitute in America thinks you're sexy?" JJ asked, not exactly teasing, but not meaning to be insulting.

We sat down on Shelley's threadbare, dilapidated sofa. She evidently thought that her figure was displayed to the best advantage standing up, however, because even though there was a fraying purple armchair opposite the sofa, she neglected it and stood in front of us with her arms folded over her ample bosom. Spencer pointedly looked anywhere but at her, breaking with how I'd seen him before, always making eye contact when he was talking.

"I would say I'm sorry for your loss," he said, rubbing his hands together, "but you don't look too cut up about it."

Shelley sat down. She sighed, and ran her hot pink fingernails through her bleached platinum-blonde hair. "Jake and I were close… once."

I leaned forwards. "But?"

She gave me a disgusted look. "_But_," she said pointedly, "three years ago we had a… falling out, and I told him I never wanted to speak to him again and moved to Texas. I moved back a month ago when Mom died, but I didn't talk to him at all."

"It must have been a big falling out," Spencer commented, somehow more willing to look at her now that he didn't have to bypass an enormous expanse of bust to see her face.

She leaned forwards in her chair, and the neck of her already low-cut dress fell even further. Spencer quickly and innocently averted his eyes. "It was spectacular," she confirmed smugly. I frowned. "Of course, I was upset to hear that he had died," she amended, almost as an afterthought, "but I guess he's just… like an old friend I don't speak to anymore."

"Can you tell me what the falling out was about?" JJ asked. Shelley's big eyes flickered distrustfully in her direction.

"That's private," she said protectively.

"It could be important," JJ pressed.

"It was a big argument, that should be all you need to know," she rejoined hotly, raising her voice.

"Big enough to kill him?" Spencer threw the question in her face and the impact struck her like a physical blow.

"You think _I_ killed him?" she whispered, looking terrified. Spencer shrugged.

"He was your brother and you're not showing any signs of remorse," he said dismissively.

"He was my baby brother! I wouldn't kill him, just over that stupid little argument!"

"But you'd move away from all your family and friends, to Texas, of all places, over it?" JJ prompted.

"And what did Rebecca Green ever do to you?" Spencer accused. Shelley looked up, genuinely surprised.

"Who the hell is Rebecca Green?" Spencer slapped the pictures of the three victims on the table between them. Shelley's eyes widened.

"Oh my God," she breathed. "That's Stephie Palmer! She used to be engaged to Jake! Oh, my… I liked her," she said. Spencer's eyes narrowed, but Shelley seemed to have forgotten we were there. "Mom hated her, though," she continued reminiscently. "That's why they didn't make it – she didn't like many of his girlfriends." She slowly turned the photos upside down, and when she spoke again, her voice trembled.

"I always told myself I'd make it up to Jakey, one day," she said shakily. "Now I'll never get the chance." JJ leaned forward and placed a hand on Shelley's knee.

"I'm sorry," she said softly. "His funeral is on Tuesday." Shelley nodded sadly.

"Would you happen to know the name of his last girlfriend? Maybe he brought someone to your mother's funeral?" Spencer sounded slightly embarrassed at his accusations. Shelley seemed to recover, her face brightening considerably.

"He _did_ bring a girl to the funeral, actually. Pretty girl, even though she was a ginger… pretty name… French… Angel? An… Angelique."

"Angelique…?"

"Thomson? Thompson? Something like that… she had tiny breasts, though," Shelley commented, pushing her own together as if to accentuate the difference in size. JJ's mouth twitched as she glanced at Spencer, who now looked faintly nauseous.

"We should get that to Garcia," she said.

"I'll do it," Spencer offered quickly, standing up. I got the impression he really, _really_ wanted to get out of there.

"No, Reid, let Juliette do it," amended JJ. He gave her a pleading look. "She needs to get acquainted with Garcia somewhere along the line. Now may be the best chance we'll get." He stood there, frozen, for a second, unwilling to let the opportunity to leave the room slip through his fingers, but accepting the validity of JJ's point. Finally, he pulled out his phone and threw it at me, before flopping back onto the sofa.

"It's on there as 'Penny Garcia'," he said sullenly.

I grinned. "Thanks." I'm sure, had he been any younger or less mature, he would have stuck out his tongue. I escaped into the hallway and began flicking through the contacts on Spencer's phone. I found it quickly: _Penny Garcia_. I pressed the talk button.

There was a _click_ as the phone connected. Then a young, lively woman's voice spoke flirtatiously. "Talk to me, gorgeous."

I frowned. "Uh, is this Penny Garcia?"

"Yes… this isn't Reid." Suddenly the voice sounded scared, over-agitated.

"No need to get so nervous," I said hastily. "I'm Juliette Clearwater."

"Oh," Garcia seemed to relax again, sounding bubbly and cheerful. "Morgan told me about you."

I sighed. Great. My last chance at a friend on the team had been ruined before I'd even begun. She probably already hated me. "None of it good, I suppose."

The response came quickly, menace barely concealed under the bubbly tone. "That had better not have been a euphemism." I began to wonder if Penelope Garcia was bipolar.

"No, I meant that at face value," I said hesitantly. "Possessive much?"

"I'm allowed to be." She sounded cheerful and flirtatious again. "I'm allowed to be nervous, too – last time someone I didn't know answered the phone, it was the section chief."

I giggled. "That must have gone well."

"Oh, tremendously. I was probably lucky not to lose my job. Did you want something, sugar?"

As much as I disliked people I didn't know calling me 'sugar', I figured that it would only get worse if I did know her, so I let it go. "Yes… everything you can give me on Angelique Thomson, or Thompson, or something like that."

"Angelique Thomson, or Thompson, or something like that," she repeated, and I heard the sound of keys tapping faster than I'd ever heard anyone type before. I waited, catching my breath, leaning against the wall of Shelley Montgomery's dark hallway.

I didn't wait long. "Angelique _Thompson_ is a hairdresser for _Pearl_ salon downtown… no previous criminal record… ooh, she's a pretty little thing."

"Redhead?" I asked quickly.

"Yeah. _Gorgeous_ green eyes… you want an address?"

"Yes, please." She gave it to me speedily. I dug a pen and my notepad from my satchel and wrote it down.

"Anything else I can do for you?" she asked sweetly.

"No, thanks."

"Well, then, tell Reid to use his own phone next time, you nearly gave me a heart attack." I wondered what it was she'd said to the section chief.

"Oh, he wanted to. Shelley Montgomery came on a bit… heavy."

Garcia giggled girlishly. "I'll bet she did… well, nice talking to you."

"Yeah, you too." I meant it, too; she didn't hate me! I savored the moment for a second before rejoining Spencer, JJ and Shelley in the living room. Spencer looked up, his dark eyes pleading.

"Tell me you've got something," he said. JJ smiled.

"She's a hairdresser downtown. I have an address." He looked as though he could have kissed me. I pushed the thought of how I'd react to that out of my mind firmly.

"Thank God! I mean, er… thank you for your time, Ms. Montgomery," he said awkwardly. She flashed white teeth at him. She seemed to have made a complete recovery from the shock of the pictures, which had disappeared from the table.

"You're welcome, doll," she said flirtatiously. "Anytime."

"You think Thompson's it?" I asked as the door swung shut behind us. "Garcia said she had no previous criminal record."

"That doesn't really mean anything," Spencer said, taking his phone off me. "Shelley said there was something about Thompson, a smile that didn't reach her eyes… she's worth a look, at least."

"Yes, you and Shelley got on rather well, didn't you?" I said wryly. He shuddered, forcing a laugh out of both JJ and I. "You're so innocent, Spencer. It's cute." He gave a hollow laugh as JJ gripped his shoulder in camaraderie.

"She's right, Reid," she said, laughing. "You're so cute – I assume you meant little-boy kind of cute?" She shot back at me.

"Of course," I assured her. I clapped Spencer on the back. "That kind of cuteness goes far with trailer-trash like Shelley Montgomery." Spencer didn't attempt to shrug either of us off, but he changed the subject quickly.

"So how'd it go with Garcia?" he asked as we reached JJ's sleek car.

"She doesn't hate me!" I said ecstatically. "She was a bit… bipolar-seeming, though."

JJ kicked the car into life. "Garcia doesn't hate anybody," she said, as if this was a fault, not a sparkling gem of a personal characteristic. "Bipolar how?"

"You don't hate anybody either," Spencer interrupted.

"I do, too," she protested. I decided not to interfere, sitting in the back seat and watching them.

"Name one person you hate," he challenged confidently. JJ tapped her fingers agitatedly on the steering wheel, but said nothing. "Well?" Spencer prompted.

"I can't _name_ someone, Reid! I don't hate anyone _now_, but I have – sometimes…" She reached over to slap Spencer on the knee to stop him laughing. "Well, name one person _you_ hate."

He shut up quickly. "Uh…" I laughed.

"There you go," JJ said firmly, "hate is a very strong word. Too much hate is bad for you. So, Juliette, bipolar how?"

"Well," I said slowly, 'she answered really flirtatiously," I imitated her voice, "and when I answered, she panicked. She said the last time someone she wasn't expecting answered the phone it was the section chief."

JJ gave a high peal of laughter. "I remember that! It was that time in Milwaukee…"

Spencer laughed too. "Oh," he said, "no wonder she was nervous."

"What happened?" I asked eagerly.

"The section chief, Strauss, was working with us in Milwaukee and she used Morgan's phone to call Garcia… Morgan and Garcia flirt a lot, so Garcia answered the phone with, _give me something dirty._" I chuckled – this sounded like the lively woman who had answered the phone. "The look on Strauss' face was priceless."

"The look on _Morgan's_ face was priceless," Spencer chipped in.

"And I can only imagine the look on Garcia's face," JJ finished.

"Oh, well, that clears up the bipolar-ness, then," I told the about the rest of the conversation. "…and then she went all threatening on me and told me I had better not be euphemizing."

"Sounds like Garcia," Spencer sighed. Then he sat bolt upright. "Oh, God, we'd better tell Hotch what's happening!" His phone flew up to his ear. "Hotch? I'm _so_ sorry about not calling earlier… Shelley Montgomery's a distracting kind of person –" JJ and I lapsed into giggles. "Uh, no, sir, JJ and Juliette just seem to have hit it off, that's all. Yes, sir, we did. Her name is Angelique Thompson, Garcia gave us the address and we're headed there now… yes, sir. Yeah?" He was silent for a few seconds, and his eyes flicked back to me. "Yes, sir. I understand." He brought the phone back down.

"What'd he say?" JJ asked, fiddling with a GPS system mounted on the dashboard.

"JJ, watch the road, I'll do that," he instructed as the car's path wobbled slightly. "We'll wait for the rest of the team there, he thinks we might have to search the house." He glanced back at me again. "He also said that if a search is necessary, Juliette, you're not authorized to participate."

Even though I'd known this was coming, my heart sank. "Search, as in the dramatic kicking-open-of-doors-guns-out televised version?" I asked sadly.

"It's not usually that dramatic, but that's the general idea," said JJ, sounding ultra-sympathetic. I tried to put on a happy face.

"Can I see your gun?" I asked Spencer. He grinned and held out a sleek black pistol. "Cool."

JJ giggled. "You think that's cool," she said teasingly. "Morgan's is bigger." This must have been a long-standing argument within the team, because Spencer answered immediately.

"It is not," he argued indignantly. JJ briefly took her eyes off the road to turn to me.

"It is," she told me, as though dealing with a defiant toddler.

"No, it's not!" he insisted.

"Yes, it is!" she was laughing now. Finally, the GPS between them beeped. "This is it," she said. The two of them sobered quickly as JJ pulled over the car.

The house was dark, with all the curtains drawn, and seemed empty somehow, not like a house whose inhabitants were temporarily out, but like a house that was completely dead. Spencer drew in a long breath. "No we wait for the others."

JJ twisted round in her seat until she was looking at me. "It's great to have someone in the field you can laugh with like this," she said, smiling at me. "Emily's great, but she takes her job very seriously."

"Thank you," I said, as earnestly as I could. I took advantage of being in a car with the two FBI agents in my dream job that didn't hate me.

And we waited.

* * *

They pulled up five minutes later in a black four-wheel-drive with tinted windows. They were already kitted out in blue vest-like things printed with 'FBI' in big white letters. Spencer and JJ quickly donned them too.

"Can I do anything to help?" I asked, not really expecting an answer.

"You can watch, with me," Gideon replied, coming to stand next to me but not meeting my eyes.

"Thank you, sir," I said.

"Right," Hotch began. "The usual drill – Prentiss, you knock on the door, if no-one answers, we go in." And they were off, just like that. I leant against J's car as Gideon and I watched. Prentiss knocked on the door and waited.

And waited. Spencer, concealed beside the door, took his gun slowly out of its holster. I tried not to laugh; he looked comically out of place with the pistol in his hand.

Morgan switched places with Prentiss, his own gun held up, and tried the doorknob. When it turned easily, he threw it open and jumped into the room with a cry of "FBI!"

Gideon and I waited in silence as they filed into the house. Occasional shouts of 'clear' drifted back. Eventually, the silence grew awkward.

"Sir," I said, trying to keep nerves out of my voice, "I know you don't want me here, and… I'm sorry."

He looked at me for a minute. Then he gave me an expression with the same effect as a shrug and looked back at the house. "You are here, so you may as well learn something."

I bit my lip and turned my own gaze on the house. "Thank you, sir," I repeated. Silence stretched unchecked again. "So what happens next?"

"Well, if she's not in there, we look for clues as to where to look next," he said levelly, his eyes unmoving. "If she is, we take her back for questioning and hopefully get a confession."

"What if she's innocent?"

He did shrug this time. "We keep looking."

Morgan and Hotch emerged then, a thin red-haired woman between them. Prentiss, JJ and Spencer followed. Gideon walked up to meet them. "Prentiss, JJ, come back with me and her," he jerked his head towards the woman I assumed was Thompson. "Reid, Morgan, take Clearwater and search the place."

Hotch helped Thompson, who looked as if she hadn't stopped crying all week, into JJ's car (which I promptly stepped away from) and shut the door firmly. "I'll stay with you three," he said to Spencer. I started slightly as he beckoned me over. "You –"

"I heard, sir," I said, in what I hoped was a demure way.

"Okay then." JJ smiled kindly at me as she got into the driver's seat of her car. Hotch turned and walked back into the house. Morgan made as if to follow him, but Spencer called him back.

"Morgan, wait," he said. Morgan turned back. "Show her your gun, quickly." I snorted.

Morgan rolled his eyes impatiently. "Reid, I told you, man, mine's bigger," he said, holding it out in front of him, "and we don't have time for this _now_." Spencer ignored the last comment and thrust his own gun next to it.

The looked to be exactly the same size. It was ridiculous. I shook my head, grimaced, and looked back up at Spencer. "His is bigger," I said sadly. Morgan laughed easily.

"What? Oh my God, I don't believe this! You _both_ need glasses –" Spencer cried indignantly. I cut him off.

"Maybe it's just that you're not wearing _your_ glasses," I told him. Morgan ducked expertly as Spencer made a wide, sweeping gesture with the gun.

"I don't _need_ glasses to see that mine is obviously bigger," he retaliated. I laughed.

"You two cannot _possibly_ be trying to impress a seventeen year-old girl by comparing the size of your guns, _now._"

Spencer flinched at the sound of Hotch's stern, reprimanding voice. "Sorry, sir," he said meekly. Hotch gave him a look that obviously said _you'd better be._ He glanced down at the two guns.

"Morgan's is bigger," he said, and walked away again.

* * *

Half an hour later, we were back at the bureau, having found absolutely nothing conclusive in the house except an empty tissue box and what looked like its entire contents, used, in a pile on the bed. JJ met us at the door.

"We were about to call you," she said, leading us back to where Gideon was sat at his desk, looking defeated. "We let Thompson go. She was clearly innocent – her and Montgomery were still together when he died. He found an engagement ring in an old pair of his socks yesterday; it looks like he was just building up the courage to propose. She's also confident that Montgomery and Rebecca Green never knew each other. Looks like our theory was wrong."

"Great," Morgan sighed, flopping into a chair.

"Yeah," said Spencer, sinking slowly into the one next to him. "We're back to square one."


	4. Friendship

Finally, when the clock in the corner read 8.00pm, Hotch stopped us. "We'd better break for the day. Go home, get some rest, and I expect to see you all bright eyed at 7o'clock sharp tomorrow morning." There was a sudden clamor as everyone began to stack papers and move chairs back under desks where they belonged. Then, one by one, very noisily, they all left. Prentiss said hurried goodbyes to everyone except Spencer and I before hastening out the door; everyone else paused to say good-night to the rest of the office. Soon, Spencer and I were alone with Hotch, who was fiddling with the blinds on the far set of windows. He turned and found us still standing there behind him.

"Good work today, Clearwater," he said gruffly, as though the words hurt his teeth. "I didn't expect you to hold your own against them."

"Sir, if I'd known how serious this was, I would've waited for a smaller case before bringing her," Spencer said apologetically. Hotch gave a tired smile, the first I'd seen on his serious face.

"It's all right, Reid," he said, picking up an official-looking briefcase from behind a desk, "next time I'll pay more attention to what you're saying. Although, having said that, having you here hasn't been nearly as problematic as I thought. I fully expect to see you here tomorrow morning, doing the same standard of work." I grinned happily.

"Yes, sir."

"Good. Now, you two go home and relax for a while." I almost laughed; I could tell Spencer wouldn't relax at all, and I knew I couldn't possibly. It had been too much of an exciting day. Hotch tried another smile, failed, and left the room. Spencer gestured that I should follow.

"Do you want a lift anywhere?" he asked, graciously holding the door open. I shook my head.

"I'm not really ready to go home yet," I said slowly as we huddled into a lift. "I was going to go for a walk down to the wharf to prepare myself for Charisse." He laughed through his nose.

"Do you want company?" he asked, his hand brushing my shoulder as he reached over to the lift button. I smiled, surprised.

"Yes, please." He smiled back and struck up a conversation effortlessly, as though he did it all the time. I wasn't expecting that. He seemed like the kind of person who found conversation difficult.

"So how old is Charisse?" he asked.

"She's 24. She was advertising for a flatmate because she wanted to get away from one of her not-nice boyfriends… I think she wanted the company more than the extra cash. She pays most of the rent, and the flat's not small."

"I didn't realise yoga teachers were paid that much."

"They're not," I replied as the lift doors slid open, "but she takes yoga and Pilates classes at three different locations: two gyms and a dance studio." He made a faint 'oh' noise and we walked in a comfortable silence for a while. I turned my phone on and flicked Charisse a text: _walking with friend from BAU. Txt when coming home._ I looked up at him to find that his soft brow eyes had been watching me. "What?"

"You did really well today, you know," he said casually.

"Thanks," I said. "Prentiss didn't think so."

"I don't know what's wrong with Emily," he replied thoughtfully. "She's not usually like that. She takes her job very seriously… I think she just thought you'd slow the rest of us down." He was trying to make me feel better, but he was just making me feel worse.

"What if she's right?" I asked, voicing the thought that had been running through my head in the quieter moments of the day. "What if I am just slowing you all down?"

He looked at me, genuinely surprised. "Juliette, you're not!" He stopped walking then, turning to face me. "Even Hotch admits it! You were the one who realised we were looking for a woman. I hadn't even considered the possibility –"

"But what if that was wrong? And you all accepted it because you wanted to believe that I could do this, but there's a guy out there laughing his head off because we've walked right past him?" I kept walking, making him run a few paces to keep up.

"If you were wrong, then we all would have been wrong sooner or later, because it makes sense," he said. "One thing I've learned here is that you can't sit there doing nothing and asking yourself, _what if I was wrong?_ You've just got to do what you _think_ is right."

I thought about this. He was dead serious, which should have comforted me, but it just made me more worried that I was distracting him, blinding him somehow. "But, Spencer, _nobody_ in your team likes me," I protested. "Prentiss openly hates me. Morgan took you aside to tell you it was stupid of you to bring me. I didn't miss that _I'll-talk-to-you-later_ look Gideon gave you. Even Hotch only said that I "wasn't nearly as problematic as he'd thought", not that I was a help in any way."

"JJ likes you," he said stubbornly.

"You said it yourself, Spencer, JJ likes everybody! Like you said, you would have figured out that the unsub was female sooner or later anyway, and even knowing the sex doesn't help much. What if we should take something from that? I'm not meant to be here. I _shouldn't_ be here."

"Then don't come back," he said simply. I looked at him, shocked. Even though it was what I told myself I wanted, I couldn't believe he was just going to give up on me. Just like that? _God, I really must be bad,_ I thought to myself. He caught my eye and shrugged. "Juliette, I brought you because you remind me of myself. I always knew that the BAU was where I belonged. If Hotch and Gideon hadn't liked me, I wouldn't have given up." He looked away again, down the road to the wharf. "Maybe we're not as alike as I thought."

I didn't know what to say. Here he was, the genius of the BAU, respected by his colleagues and superiors alike, pretty much my general hero, and he was telling me I was _like _him? At that moment, I would have given anything for that to be true. "Thank you," I said softly. Of course I'd come back. Yesterday I would have given anything to be where I had been all day. Now, I couldn't give up my dream just because I wasn't the case superstar. If I 'wasn't a problem', I might as well stay and learn all I could for the day when I could come back as a legitimate part of the team. And even when I was complaining, a part of me knew that.

"For what?" he asked, as though he didn't think he'd done anything for me.

Everything. Befriending me, bringing me, not letting me give up… it mans a lot to me." I realised it sounded weak as soon as it left my mouth. _It means a lot to me_. Eurgh. Understatement of the century and it still sounded lame.

He smiled. "You're welcome," he said brightly. "You're an easy person to like."

Okay. At this point, something in me, some deep, built-in alarm bell, went off. We sounded enormously sappy, like a couple in a film that was just about to kiss. And even though in the coffee shop that morning it may have seemed all right, the idea of his sculpted lips meeting mine had grown less and less appealing as my respect for him grew throughout the day. Time for some friendly banter. "You're not," I said casually.

He stopped dead in his tracks. "What?" I stopped too, and turned until I was facing him, letting him see the shakes of suppressed laughter that were making my whole body tremble. He realised I was joking, and relaxed. I let the laughter go and he hesitantly joined in.

"Well," I said reasonably between peals of mirth, "I'm just saying that some people might find your resemblance to a walking encyclopedia a bit frustrating."

"Some do," he admitted as we resumed walking towards the glimmer of orange sunset at the end of the street. "Morgan hates it. Hotch tells me to shut up all the time." I laughed again, wiping the beginnings of tears away from my eyes. Spencer put on a slightly higher voice than usual to imitate himself. "Technically, this could be possible –_Reid, shut up._" I laughed harder.

"Have you ever noticed that you always say the word 'technically' with the same inflection? In exactly the same way?" I put on his accent smoothly. "Technically, it could be – technically, this could be possible –" I noticed that the word 'possible' was the same, "it could be _possible_ that…" He was the one laughing now. "You _are_ like an encyclopedia," I told him, "one of the talking ones with pre-recorded messages, like when you want to check the balance on your phone…" I put on a disjointed, robotic voice, "you have ten dollars and twenty-one cents remaining."

We reached the stone outcrop that separated the road from the sea beyond it. "That's enough from you," he said in a mock-stern voice. I leant on the wall, which came up to about my bottom rib. He followed suit.

It was the most amazing sunset I'd ever seen. There were a few arrow-like streaks of cloud like exclamation marks, lit up orange and purple and every shade in between, colours colliding and combining to make a spectacular, passionate frieze that stirred up excitement in the pit of my stomach. "It's beautiful," Spencer breathed beside me. I couldn't reply. I was left absolutely speechless by its majesty.

"It's amazing," I said finally. It's so romantic." To people that I had known forever, it would have confirmed that I wasn't romantically interested in them when I mentioned romance around them. I realised a few seconds after I said it that Spencer wasn't one of those people.

"Are you a romantic, then?" has asked.

"Hopeless," I replied, not looking at him. "You?" I heard his hair brush against his shirt collar as he shook his head. "Why not?"

"It's hard to be a romantic in my job," he said slowly. I frowned, still unwilling to meet his eyes. "Not only do you see every day just how much hate is in the world, but… love is created by the brain's release of endorphins into the blood. It's just a chemical reaction, just like any other emotion. It isn't something tangible, love doesn't _find_ you. You don't _find_ love. Your brain makes it up."

"It's like they say, though, isn't it," I replied absently. "It's what you make of it."

"But that's the point," he said, "you _make_ it. It doesn't exist outside your mind."

"Does it matter?" I argued. "If your brain thinks you're in love, doesn't that mean you are?"

"If you think you're a good singer, does that have to mean that nobody flinches every time you open your mouth?" he shot back quickly.

"It doesn't_ have_ to, but sometimes it does," I said. I looked at him then, elbows resting on the stone wall, staring blankly into the raging passion in front of him. He shrugged. "Well, you'd be the world's worst boyfriend." His mouth twitched into a hollow smile. He turned his head my way. I quickly dropped my gaze and turned back to the sea. Neither of us spoke for a while.

"You know it would never work between us, don't you?" he said finally.

"What?" I asked, surprised. Our eyes met, then. He was smiling, but sadly, as though explaining to a child why he had to go to work.

"A relationship between us would never work. You know that, right? I mean, I'm seven years older than you –"

I cut him off before it because any more awkward. "I know a couple with a twenty-year age gap," I said coolly, "so I think we could make it work if we wanted to, but I… don't."

"What do you –"

"I mean, I like you, Spencer, a lot, but not in that way."

"Oh." He sounded relieved. "Me too. I mean, when I first met you, at the library, I did, but now… platonically, I really like you." He said it as if it settled everything. I didn't know what he was talking about.

I blinked. "Okay, you have my permission to be a walking encyclopedia for a minute. Platonically?" He smiled genuinely.

"Like, as friends." Oh. I smiled back as I watched him. He put up a hand as if to self-consciously re-adjust his glasses, remembered he'd taken them off in the elevator, and scratched the bridge of his nose to try and cover it up. I was overwhelmed by a desire to hug him, but I quashed it; he probably wasn't aware that I hugged all of my friends.

Like the perfectly timed icebreaker she was in person, Charisse chose that moment to call me again, and _Killer Queen_ broke through the slightly awkward silence between us. I laughed. "Sorry," I said, extracting the phone from my pocket again. He shook his head.

"Hey, Char."

"Hey, Juju! I just got your text! I didn't know you had a friend in the BAU!" I giggled at the offended note in her shrill voice.

"I didn't, until this morning."

"Where are you now, babe?" Even though I knew exactly where I was, I couldn't help looking around me before I answered her question.

"Down at the wharf." I gave her street names in case she was being paranoid again.

"Looking at the sunset?" she asked happily. I guessed she was in a good mood, then.

"Yeah. It's beautiful, Char." She laughed.

"I'm sure it is, cutie. So when are you coming home?" I sighed. I didn't want to go home. I was so comfortable there, watching the sun go down with Spencer, that I never wanted it to end.

"I don't know. Today's been so amazing. I feel like if I go home, there'll be nothing to keep me sure that I didn't just imagine the whole thing." Spencer mumbled something that I couldn't quite hear over Charisse telling me she felt neglected at home by herself. "Sorry, Char. Hey, hold on a sec?" I pulled the phone away from my ear, but I could still hear her voice even with the speaker pressed against my shoulder. "What was that, Spencer?"

"I said, you could come back to my place," he said steadily, standing up properly. "If you don't mind the sofa, of course." A smile crept over my face again.

"Is that okay? Are you sure?" He nodded happily. "All right then. Thanks!" He murmured a 'no problem'. I picked up the phone again. "Char, I don't think I'll be coming home tonight, honey. I've been offered the sofa."

"Juju, you've only known this person since nine o'clock this morning. Are you sure you can trust them?" I looked up at Spencer.

"Char, if you took one look at Spencer, you'd know the answer to that question. Honest, he's not that kind of guy."

"It's a guy? Oh, Juju! Is he cute? Make sure you do it safe, honey –"

"Charisse! He's just a friend! Come on, would I go anywhere near there with someone I'd known for this long?" Spencer, picking up the gist of our conversation, laughed.

"Well, honey, I didn't think you'd go to anyone's house for the night if you'd only known them for twelve hours, not with your obsession with criminals, but I suppose if he's an FBI agent, he'll keep you safe."

"Uh-huh. I'll call you tomorrow." I hung up Trust Charisse to throw my "criminal obsession" back in my face. Honestly. Sometimes she was like the mother I'd never really had. Other times she was like an awesome big sister. Sometimes, like just then, she switched from one to the other and back again alarmingly fast.

"Thank you, again," I said to Spencer, leaning my back against the wall. He chuckled softly.

"No problem. I figured that if you woke up on my sofa, you'd know you hadn't imagined the whole thing." He said 'imagined' teasingly.

"Hey, no joke," I said, poking him in his hollow stomach. "You have no idea how vivid my imagination is."

"I know exactly what you mean," he replied seriously. Then he abruptly pushed his weight off the wall. "So," he said brightly. "My car is just down there," he pointed back the way we had come. "We could pick up pizza or something on the way."

I eyed him mock-critically. "Pizza? How many times a week do you get pizza?"

"Hey," he said indignantly. "I haven't had pizza in ages."

"Uh-huh. So what do you usually get for dinner, then? Kentucky Fried?" He laughed.

"I'm actually not a bad cook, thank you very much," he said. I looked him up and down. I didn't buy it.

"Oh, I'm sure you make really good toast." He pretended to punch me amiably on the arm in outrage. Then he stopped.

"Yeah," he admitted. "My cornflakes aren't that bad, either. I'm still working on coffee. Starbucks somehow manages to do it better than I do." He led me into a parking building by the library. "This is me."

I snorted when I saw the dented old white mini. Somehow I'd imagined him having something like this, that looked like it was about to fall apart where it stood. "Nice ride, man." He laughed too, digging around in his satchel for the keys. "Does it have a crank around the front, or do we just have to push it to get it started?"

"Shut up," he retaliated, producing the keys. "I don't see you driving a Ferrari."

"All right, all right," I said, following him by getting in the passenger side, "you're one better than me. I don't have a car. On the odd occasion that I need one, I borrow Charisse's."

"How often is that?" The car started smoothly, which surprised me; I'd expected it to take at least two tries before he could kick it into life.

"Not often at all. I don't go to school anymore, so the only places I ever have to go are the shops and work, and we live within walking distance of those."

"And the library," he reminded me, grinning.

"Yeah," I agreed, "and the library."

"Where do you work?" he asked, not taking his eyes off the road.

"_La Cloche? _The restaurant…" he nodded. "I work in the kitchen for the dinner rush Friday, Saturday and Sunday, and I lay tables all day Sunday."

"Ah," he said, "so your mockery of my culinary expertise is somewhat justified, then."

I laughed. "Somewhat." I neglected to mention that by 'working in the kitchen' I meant taking out the garbage. It didn't seem necessary.

It was like a dream, the kind of dream that's far too perfect for you to have created in your sleep. Like a daydream. The best kind of daydream.

We drove on.

* * *

**A/N: Okay, so lame ending... oh well. It had to finish somewhere! **

**-for you**


	5. Earlye in the Morning

**A/N: Finally got a computer for the day, so here you are, another fantabulous, shorter chapter. Sorry, gothgirlreid, didn't mean to put you off there. Thank you so much to the few people reviewing! You make me feel loved. I love you.**

**-for you!**

* * *

It was quiet when Spencer Reid woke up, before the sun had pushed its rays through his curtains, feeling owlishly wide awake. He rolled over and looked at the alarm blinking the time in red LED: 4:31am. He sighed. He wasn't usually a morning person, but this morning he felt bright and ready fro the day's work, his mind already buzzing with possible leads, eight-pointed stars and severed arms flashing in front of his eyes.

His hand was on the doorhandle before he remembered. Juliette Clearwater would still be asleep on his sofa. Reid employed a word he didn't usually like to use as he thought of the teenager's reaction if he'd walked into his living room in his bare chest and pajama pants. He doubled back and found a clean shirt in his ardrobe. He donned it, along with a pair of trousers. Then, trying to be as quiet as he could, he opened the door and padded out through the tiny hallway into the cramped main room of the apartment. He glanced at the sofa and got a bit of a shock; the blankets had been twisted into an obscure position, but the sofa was completely unoccupied.

Juliette was in his kitchen, the pantry door open, a thoughtful expression on her face. Her long dark hair was crinkly, like elastic that had been wrapped around cardboard, and pulled back into a loose ponytail over one shoulder. She smiled at him when she looked up to find him in the doorway. She gestured towards the open pantry.

"This is very sad," she told him by way of a greeting. He came to stand next to her, which was difficult owing to the distinct lack of space in the kitchen. He had to agree; the state of his pantry was lamentable. A box of cornflakes stood alone in one corner, a small assortment of spreads, crackers and other basic foods in the other. A container of instant coffee powder lay on its side in the middle. He sighed again.

"Yeah. I need to go to the shops, I was going to go yesterday after the library…" he looked at her, expecting another friendly jibe. It didn't come. "What are you doing up at this time?" he asked concernedly. She gave a ghostly smile.

"I'm a morning person. Charisse hates it."

"Four thirty?"

"Usually it's more like six," she said, shrugging half-heartedly. "I had a… well, I guess you could call it a nightmare. I didn't feel like going back to sleep. You?"

He tried a smile. "No, I'm not usually a morning person, ask anyone at the BAU. I just… woke up. What was the dream about/ You know if you tell someone, you won't have it again."

"It was… Mom. She used to say that, too." Reid's heart wrenched at the sad smile on Juliette's delicate face. "We used to be really close, before it got really bad. She was always around, you know? She'd play make-believe games with me for hours, and then suddenly someone I couldn't see started telling her, what was she doing, and didn't she have better things to do."

Reid bit his lip and wondered what to do as a gleaming tear slipped from her dark eyes. "But she always stood up to me, not just to Dad, but to… _them_, too." He didn't need to ask who she meant by _them_.

Another tear rolled down her cheek. Reid hesitantly reached out and wrapped his arms around her. She hugged him tightly, sniffing hard to stem the flow of tears. "It doesn't stop hurting," she said into his shirt.

"No," he whispered, clutching her closer to him protectively, "it doesn't." He tried desperately not to think of his own mother.

The toaster on the bench behind them released its load into the air, startling Juliette into letting him go, whirling around quickly and catching the two browned slices of bread neatly, one in each hand. Reid voiced his approval of her reflexes. She grinned, dropping the toast onto a plate and wiping her eyes. He got the butter out of the fridge for her. "Do you want one?" she asked, spreading butter over the other. He shook his head.

"We'll stop at Starbucks on the way in," he said. "I'll get a coffee." She gave him a sarcastic look, now buttering the second piece.

"Coffee's not enough for breakfast, Spencer," she said sternly, "you need at least a piece of toast. And besides, we have two and a half hours before we need to be there. That's plenty of time for breakfast." He rolled his eyes; his own mother had never been like that, but he guessed that most would have been.

"Whatever, I'll make some toast later then," he dismissed. She frowned, but turned back to her toast and watched it intently for a while. "Sorry," he teased, "my cheap old bread doesn't do tricks or anything, you don't need to watch it like that." She relaxed and turned back to the pantry.

He grinned as a frown crept back over her face. "What am I going to put on it?" He laughed.

"Uh… peanut butter."

She eyed him cynically. "Peanut butter? I ask you what I should have on my toast and you say – oh."

"What?" he asked, knowing he'd missed something. "Are you allergic?" She grinned.

"No, but Charisse is allergic to anything that moves, and a few things that don't. I don't usually like it, except when I'm sick. When I'm sick I crave peanut butter, I don't eat anything else. It's the only time we keep it in the house."

Reid grimaced sympathetically. "Okay, so no peanut butter. Uh, I've got…" he looked in the pantry. "Not much. Honey? I think that's some kind of yeast extract… uh…" he pulled open the fridge door and a magnet fell off it. "Marmalade? Cheese – oh, no, that doesn't look edible, I'll throw that out…" he tossed the green fluffy cheese in the rubbish bin. "That looks like it could be strawberry jam," he opened the jar and sniffed it. "Or beetroot chutney." She laughed.

"I'll go with honey, thanks," she said, taking it from the pantry.

Half an hour later, they were sitting at the table together. Juliette was dusting the crumbs off her hands, having eaten the toast painfully slowly. Reid wondered whether she was trying to make him jealous and make himself some. Then his phone rang from where he'd placed it next to him. It was Hotch.

"Morning, Hotch," he said brightly, anticipating a growl or groan in response.

"Reid, we've got another body. A woman called it in ten minutes ago, same place as the others." An underlying tone of exhaustion betrayed the time of morning in Hotch's usual businesslike manner.

What was she doing down there at 5o'clock in the morning?" he asked incredulously.

"Probably taking a shortcut home from the club, they say she sounded intoxicated. She's not the one, don't worry."

"You say don't worry, but that's the fourth in five days, sir, and we're nowhere at the moment-"

"Well, get down here and you'll be somewhere," Hotch interrupted. "You haven't seen the bodies yet."

Reid looked across the table at Juliette, her eyes narrowed as she listened intently. "What about Clearwater, sir?"

"Call her at a sensible hour, but don't wake her up –"

"She's already awake, sir," Reid out in, "she slept on my sofa last night."

Hotch sighed. "Well, in that case, I suppose she can come along, but, Reid, make sure she knows _exactly _what she's about to see. The unsub doesn't exactly giftwrap their bodies and I don't want a teenage girl breaking down at my crime scene."

"She can handle it, sir," Reid replied, "but I'll reiterate for her. We'll see you in ten minutes."

"Make it twenty, Reid, grab some breakfast."

"Yes, sir." He put down the phone to find Juliette staring at him expectantly.

"_Another_ victim?" she asked. He nodded.

"We'd better go," he said, standing up. She stood up too, picking up her plate.

"Spencer, you haven't had breakfast," she scolded.

He snorted impatiently. "No time," he replied. She clicked her tongue and held out a hand gently to stop him from walking away.

"You get your shoes on and your stuff together and grab my bag. By the time you've started the car, I'll be there with some toast and you can eat it on the way."

He rolled his eyes. She wouldn't give up until he agreed, he could see that. So he just shrugged and hurried back into his bedroom.

He had to rev the engine twice before she came sprinting out the door, a plate of toast balancing in one hand. She jumped into the car beside him and he moved away slowly. The smell of the toast wafted through the car. Reid looked at it, his mouth watering. "That's not fair," he said sulkily. She picked up her bag from the floor.

"What?"

"You even make toast better than I do." He picked up a piece. "Peanut butter?"

"Just for you," she replied jokingly. He took a bite and tried not to do the pathetic thing and sigh; it was _good._

* * *

Twenty minutes later they pulled up next to the side-street and hurried into the alleyway. Reid had insisted that they still stop at Starbucks for his morning coffee, so the two of them clutched Styrofoam cups. He looked at Juliette as they approached the yellow crime-scene tape. "Your hair wasn't crinkly yesterday," he commented.

"No, it wasn't…" she tugged a strand ruefully. "It just doesn't stay straight."

"It looks good," he assured her, ducking under the tape. "Morning, sir."

Hotch looked up at them, frowning. "I didn't wake you two up," he stated. Reid shook his head, even though it wasn't a question, and heard Juliette's mumbled, 'no, sir.' "Did you get any rest at all?" he asked, one eyebrow raised. Juliette made a small noise of outrage.

"Of course we did! What are you suggesting we were doing all night?" Reid watched as Hotch's other eyebrow joined the first.

"I'm sure I don't know," he said. "I just know that Reid isn't usually awake at five o'clock in the morning unless he's here."

Reid stole Juliette's excuse. "I had an… odd dream and couldn't get back to sleep."

Hotch's piercing gaze lingered on him for a moment, then promptly trained onto something behind them. "Prentiss," he said, "good morning." Reid turned around. Emily Prentiss also sported a cup of Starbucks coffee and a paper bag that probably contained a blueberry muffin. Prentiss seemed to like them. She was looking at Juliette in surprise.

"She's still here, sir?" she asked incredulously.

Hotch shrugged. "Get used to it, Prentiss, she'll be here for a while."

"But, sir –"

"I suggest you work _with_ her, rather than try to ignore her like you did yesterday. I think you'll find you make more progress that way. Morning, Morgan." Reid turned away from Prentiss' sour face to where Derek Morgan was approaching them, rubbing his eyes.

"It's not morning yet, Hotch," he said grumpily, "it's still dark. I can't even see the body."

Hotch found a torch and illuminated the corpse splayed out in front of them. Reid saw the stump of the severed arm, the intricate shape of the star carved into the boy's hip. "Do we have ID?" he asked.

"Frank van den Burg," Hotch replied. "He was a German tourist holidaying with his sister. She'll need to be questioned." Reid remembered Shelley Montgomery and shuddered.

"I'm not questioning any more sisters," he said firmly. A snicker behind them announced JJ's arrival on the scene. Hotch greeted her, then requested that one of the crime-scene investigators swarming around the alley like flies turn over the body. Reid gasped as he saw the many cuts, incisions, burns, abrasions and the small, deep holes surrounded by purple bruising.

"I told you it wasn't pretty," JJ said to him airily. "The cuts were made by some sort of scalpel, on the others, at least, and seem to have been inflicted for fear rather than pain. They missed anything major. The burns were made by a small flame, like a candle or a cigarette lighter… the holes were definitely for torture, but no-one's been able to tell us what they were made by yet."

Morgan knelt. "The cautery is well done. Definitely had med experience."

"It's likely," Reid said. "Eighteen percent of female serial killers are-"

"Nurses," Juliette finished. "We know." He looked at her in surprise. How did she know?

He knelt next to the body, putting his glasses on and peering at the wounds. Hotch spoke from behind him. "Clearwater, you can leave if you need to, but I can't let anyone see you break down here." Reid looked up at Juliette. She was pale, but otherwise seemed all right.

"I'm fine, sir," she confirmed. She cleared her throat shakily. "I think I know what made those holes, though."

Morgan looked at her, his hands on his hips. "What?"

Juliette drew in a long breath. "A hammer and nail."

Reid borrowed a pair of latex gloves from a passing crime-scene investigator and gently prodded the bruised flesh around one of the holes. "It fits," he confirmed. "The rib around the wound has splintered, so whatever pierced the skin did it with some force. I'd say a hammer and nails would be our best bet."

"How did you know that?" Reid turned around to see Prentiss giving Juliette a surprised, mistrustful look. "Just from glancing at them from there? How did you know?"

He stood up and peeled off the gloves. Juliette looked embarrassed. "I didn't want to say anything before," she said slowly, "but this killer is a lot like the one from the book _HeartSick_, by Chelsea Cain. Whoever it is, I think they're imitating the Beauty Killer. Gretchen tortured her victims endlessly, making random cuts with a scalpel… she used different methods of torture every time. Sometimes she burned them, removed their spleens, appendixes, tongues… sometimes the bodies were practically filleted. She cauterized arteries of any limbs she removed so that the torture could last longer. She kept them on codeine, morphine, heaps of random drugs so that they were so under her control they'd beg for them. She only used a hammer and nail on Archie, her last victim, but if anyone was trying to make a statement by copying her, they'd use them. And she had a really distinctive signature: she carved a heart on their chests." She traced the shape on her own. "That's why they called her the Beauty Killer." Juliette put her head down meekly after she'd finished, as though expecting to be berated for the outburst.

Morgan let out a breath, sounding like he'd been holding it in as Juliette described Gretchen's rampage. "Are you saying we could have a copycat?"

"It's possible," Reid mused. Juliette mumbled something. "Sorry?"

"Nothing," she replied, shaking her head. "Just quoting Peter Pan: _anything is possible if you wish hard enough_."

Morgan chuckled. "Well, I could wish pretty hard that the unsub would just turn themselves in, but I bet that wouldn't happen."

"Actually, Gretchen turned herself in, so, it could," Juliette replied, smiling. Reid frowned.

"How many victims did she have before she turned herself in?" Hotch asked. Juliette grimaced.

"Two hundred, sir." JJ gasped; Hotch's face went from grim to grimmer. "But the police only found eighteen of them before she took Archie. He was number tow hundred, but she didn't kill him – well, she did, but she resuscitated him and turned herself in to save his life. That's what the book's about."

"That's all very interesting, Clearwater, but if it means we've got another hundred and ninety-six potential victims, we'd better get moving," Gideon said. Reid started slightly; he hadn't even noticed the older man was there. Juliette jumped.

"How long have you been standing there, sir?" she asked shakily.

"Long enough," he quipped back. "Garcia is awake; I think we should call her. We'll need library records for who's taken out that book. The last month should be enough."

"I'll do it," said Morgan, his phone jumping into his hand. Reid smiled at the eager note in his friend's voice. "Good morning, beautiful. Oh, no, I just couldn't sleep and had to hear your dulcet tones… Hey, come on, baby, it's almost half past six now… right. Well, I need library records for the past month on a book called _HeartSick_, by Chelsea Cain." He laughed. " Of course I love you, baby." There was a slight pause. Then Morgan's eyes widened. "_What?_ Are you sure? Okay. Thanks, baby."

He lowered the phone, looking at Reid, puzzled. Reid gave him a quizzical look. "Garcia says that nobody's taken it out this month except the guy who's got it now." He looked back at Reid. "She says you've got it."

Reid blinked. Juliette laughed next to him. "Oh my God, you do," she said. "I made you take it out yesterday. I'm so sorry, I forgot!"

"I forgot too," he admitted, taking it out of his satchel.

"Well, you read faster than the rest of us, so take it back to the bureau and start, Reid," Hotch ordered. Reid nodded. "The rest of us may as well head back too."

"I'll drive," Juliette offered when they got back to the car. "The sooner you finish that book, the better."

* * *

Half an hour later, he shut the book with a snap. The noise seemed to startle the others, who had been idly doing nothing while he read. That irritated him a little; there were other things they could be doing. The latest victim's sister hadn't been questioned yet, and if they were tourists, then most likely they would have been together when the unsub had struck. It was the obvious thing to do, wasn't it?

So why weren't they doing it? Watching him read wasn't going to make the wait shorter. The case wouldn't solve itself, surely they al knew that! As he shut the book the noise rang harshly through the room and everyone jumped. Reid cleared his throat.

"Is there a purpose to this? You guys haven't done anything for the last hour!"

JJ sat up and looked at the clock on the wall. "Oh, God," she gasped, "an hour! I didn't even notice!"

"None of us did, JJ," Hotch said soothingly. "We just… lost track, I guess."

Juliette laughed, the sound suddenly unfamiliar to Reid's ears. "You know what they say," she joked, "time flies when you're having fun."

Morgan stretched, catlike. "I was just waiting for Reid to suddenly go 'ooh!' and figure something out," he remarked. Reid sighed as annoyance seeped through him.

"That's right," he said hotly, his fists clenching, "you guys all just sit back and 'lost track of time' while I do all the work. Reid's a genius with a big scary brain. He's bound to come up with something. You know what? I got something. I think _somebody_ should go and interview van den Burg's sister and the woman who called in the body, and see if we can get anything from _them_ instead of a stupid book about journalists with pink hair and FBI agents addicted to Vicoden!" He threw the book onto the table. The rest of the team stared at him, shocked. Reid got a sort of savage pleasure from the fright on their faces at his outbursts.

Juliette, however, laughed again. "Boy, you weren't kidding when you said you weren't usually a morning person." She retrieved the book from the table and sat down again, flicking the cover as if brushing nonexistent dust from it protectively. "Did you get _anything_ from the book?"

He glared at her, anger still coursing through him. "Nothing," he said sullenly, "except that catching Gretchen was impossible. She spent _ten years_ at large and no-one even suspected her. The profiler thought she was a man working alone. It's impossible."

"Nonsense," Juliette said happily. "They were just using the wrong people. If they'd had you guys on the case, it would've been easy." She stood up and Reid found her tilting his chin up to look her in the eyes. "Come on, Spence. You're a genius. I bet you would have seen right through Gretchen Lowell." There was laughter in her eyes and Reid sensed that she was making fun of him. He scowled. She turned around to face the rest of them. "But this killer isn't Gretchen. I think the key is in the differences." She lowered her head demurely, like she had last time she offered an opinion, as though she expected to be laughed at.

"And what are the differences?" Morgan asked. "You two know Gretchen. We don't. You tell us." Reid smiled at Juliette.

"Well, the biggest difference is in the speed –"

The phone on the desk rang. Hotch answered it. "Aaron Hotchner. Oh, good." He frowned. "What? Really… ok. Thanks. Let us know if you find anything else. No, you did the right thing. Thank you. Absolutely. Bye." He put it down again and looked up at the rest of them. "They've just started the autopsy on van den Burg. The first thing they noticed when they cut him up was that his esophagus was all burned and dissolved away. They've found huge amounts of sulfuric acid in his blood."

"Sulfuric acid?" Prentiss repeated. "That's the main ingredient in-"

"Let me guess," Juliette interrupted. "Drain cleaner?" Prentiss nodded. "Gretchen sometimes finished her victims off by making them drink drain cleaner. I forgot to mention that before."

Hotch's frown deepened. "Right. So you were saying, Reid? The biggest difference…"

"…is in the speed," Reid continued. "Gretchen kept her victims for two or three days before killing and dumping them. Also, she didn't leave all her bodies for us to find. She had two hundred victims and she only left eighteen for the police. This suggests that the unsub likes the attention. Also… nobody told me what exactly the others died of." He put the last sentence awkwardly, worried that it might sound like he was reprimanding the rest of the team.

"Internal bleeding," JJ supplied. "The nails or the scalpel hit something, like the lungs, and they pretty much drowned in their own blood."

"Well, that sounds accidental to me," Reid finished, "which suggests that the unsub has enough medical experience to cauterize the arm, but nothing more than that. I don't think we'll have problems with missing spleens this time."

"Gretchen only used nails on Archie, the head of the FBI task force after her, but I remembered Gretchen after the first time I read the book because of the nails, so I think the unsub is using them because they want us to know that they're copying her," Juliette added. "And she used all sorts of drugs, paralyzing agents and hallucinogens and stuff, that the unsub doesn't. I agree with Spencer. The unsub probably has limited access to drugs, which usually means limited experience." She stopped and looked uncertainly at Reid, expecting him to carry on. He was all out of ideas.

After about a minute, when he was sure that they were finished, Morgan coughed. "So what does that tell us, other than that the unsub knows cautery but not much else?"

There was a pause. Then Reid shrugged. "I don't know," he said. "We're probably not looking for a nurse. We should go do the things that need to be done." Hotch threw a look at him that silenced him.

"Okay then, Reid, if you're so desperate to do something, take JJ and go round all the bookshops and the library and ask for their records on the book. Prentiss, take Clearwater to talk to Yvonne van den Burgh. Morgan, you can go with Gideon to find the woman who called in the body, Garcia will get her details for you." Prentiss shot Juliette a disgusted look before standing up.

"Sir –"

"You'd better not question me, Prentiss," Hotch said threateningly.

"Yes, sir." The brunette left the room. Juliette stood there awkwardly. Reid tried an encouraging smile.

"See you later, Juju," he said. She smiled back, relieved, as if she'd been afraid that Prentiss would kill her. Then she turned and followed the agent out the door.

As soon as she had gone, Reid turned to Hotch. "Sir, what are you doing? Emily will bite Juliette's head off when she tries to help."

He received another stern look from Hotch. "I know."

* * *

**A/N: Wooo! Many hours of taking advantage of the one day I'll get to use a computer have paid off… this computer keeps wanting me to say 'unsub the' instead of 'the unsub'. Oh well. **

**I have no idea when I'll be near a computer again, so don't hold your breath. However, I've written all the way up to chapter 11 because I got bored, so it's definitely coming. It's exciting. I haven't been sleeping, either – it's hard in a tent in the rain – so that helped too. Anywho. I'll start typing up the next chapter now.**

**-for you!**


	6. The Problem With Prentiss

**A/N: Here it is, my Christmas gift to you. Thank you to everyone who reviewed. I'm sorry to anyone who thinks Juliette is a bit of a Mary Sue. I'ts just easier when everyone likes her. Jente, thanks, that's really interesting... 'm Dutch myself, but I didn't know that. I was thinking as I wrote this chapter how interesting it is that every character, no matter how tiny they are in your story, has their own story... well, that's a part of their story, I guess. **

**Anyway, enjoy. **

**-for you.**

* * *

Prentiss' car was deathly quiet, so much so that the slightest noise sounded eerie and unnatural. The slight whining that came from the air-con echoed in the silence. She sat facing resolutely forwards, eyes fixed on the road, fingers tapping on the steering wheel. She was so angry that I got the feeling if I tried to speak, she'd slap me, or worse. So we shared an uncomfortable silence as the roads went flashing by, and I let my mind drift back to the early morning, when the first rays of dawn had lit up the broken body of Frank van den Burg.

It had finally made me realize that my dream was an illusion. I'd thought I was ready. I'd thought I'd been doing well. I'd thought I was in control. But I wasn't; I was out of my depth, in over my head, sailing up Excrement Creek without a paddle.

What was I doing there? I couldn't cope with this. I couldn't help these people, these professionals who all knew exactly what they were doing when I had no idea. Who was I kidding? I'd been telling myself I was prepared, that I could handle this. Hotch's stern encouragement despite his obvious disapproval of my being there had spurred me on. The rest of their resentment had made me all the more determined to do well.

But how could I? It was stupid, a perfect daydream shattered by the realization that it was real. And while I played FBI agents with Spencer, people were dying. And would keep dying until I realized how serious this was.

But the thing that disturbed me the most was that I was still unwilling to put everything down and go home. I was involved now, I wouldn't be able to sleep at night until I knew this was over. I knew what Gretchen was capable of, what she'd done to the agent on her tail.

And I didn't want to give up Spencer. He was so sweet, and so _vulnerable_. If the new Beauty Killer chose him like Gretchen had chosen Archie, then he wouldn't stand a chance. My vivid imagination presented an image of him, strapped to a table, a blonde woman with a manic grin and a scalpel standing over him…

I blinked, and the image faded, leaving only the view out of Prentiss' windscreen, swimming in and out of focus in a haze of tears. I wiped my eyes surreptitiously, hoping Prentiss wouldn't see me crying.

I felt so lost, and I knew that there was nothing I could do about it. If I gave up and went home, I knew I'd somehow be able to kid myself that I'd been helping them and I'd feel guilty. If I stayed, I'd know I was slowing them down, and I'd still feel guilty.

In the end, I decided that I couldn't hurt to have someone obsessed with _HeartSick_ on the case. I looked back at Prentiss, still staring blankly at the road. Hotch had put us together knowing how much she hated me. I supposed it was time to sort out why she hated me so much. I took a deep, steadying breath in.

"Agent Prentiss?" I enunciated the words carefully, respectfully, not missing out the 't' in her name like the others did. Her dark eyes flickered in my direction briefly, like she was watching a fly. I sighed. "I know you don't like me. I just wish I knew why."

Still not taking her eyes off the road, she shrugged. "Reid likes you."

"Is that a reason why you _shouldn't_ hate me, or the reason that you do?" Her head snapped round; she glared at me angrily. Then she swung her face forwards again. I waited for a few seconds, then lost my patience. "For God's sake, Prentiss," I exploded. She flinched. "Hotch put us here together so we could sort this out! Please, I am _begging _you, talk to me!"I sat back, panting, already ashamed at my outburst.

Prentiss pulled over the car. For a minute, I thought she was going to bodily push me out onto the sidewalk. Then she sighed and rested her head on the wheel.

"It's both," she said quietly./ "Reid likes you, that's why JJ likes you, and Morgan, and why the rest of them put up with you. But the Reid I knew would never pick up a random schoolgirl and take her to work with him. So… you're different, to him. I can't help but think that that affects him here at the bureau and in the field, and I've seen the way we work without Reid. It… offends my professionalism, if you like, to have him think that a seventeen-year-old girl can do my job just as well if not better than I can. He… he _really_ likes you."

I frowned. I didn't like the way I could see this going. I tried to show off the new word last night had added to my vocabulary. "Platonically, yeah, but-"

"No, _not_ just platonically," she retorted instantly. I sighed, disappointed.

"Damn," I said, laughing. "How come you know what that word means?"

She loosened up a bit and chuckled. "Working with Reid expands your vocabulary," she said. I shook my head. She turned serious again. "But, Clearwater, Reid likes you, not just platonically. He never looks at anyone the way I've seen him look at you, and that… I can't help but take that as a personal offence." I watched as sadness overcame her face. A smile crept over mine.

"You like him," I observed wonderingly. She started.

"What?"

"You like him, don't you?" I repeated, my smile broadening as panic flooded over her bold features.

"I don't! I mean, I respect him, he's a genius, but – platonically –"

"Don't use that word with me," I told her, giggling profusely now. "That's bull, you know it is. Come on, Prentiss, you're in the BAU, you'd think you'd be able to lie better than that." She flushed pink. I wondered whether teasing her like I would my friends was a smart idea. "What makes you think he doesn't like _you?_ You're smart, striking… I'd like you, if I were a guy." I decided I was probably digging myself a hole with that last statement, and promptly shut up.

She, thankfully, chose to ignore it, and started the car again. "I'd rather not talk about this with _you_," she said roughly. "I shouldn't have let the way I feel about you being here affect the way I work, and I regret that. I'll try to be civil from now on… but, Clearwater," she threw me a sideways glance. "Don't tell him," she pleaded. I grinned.

"I'll try not to," I teased. "That's if he hasn't already noticed, him being a _genius_ and all."

* * *

It took us far longer than it should have to talk to Yvonne. She was livid in her grief, shouting and throwing things and needing someone, _anyone_, to blame for the way she felt. The contrast was quite amazing; Stephanie Palmer's husband had withdrawn into himself while Yvonne van den Burgh had thrown herself onto us, screaming that it was our fault, we should have done something before now, and what was her _mother_ going to say? She'd moved to Germany for a better life and what had it done for them? Tomorrow she would have to go back to Munich and tell the poor woman that the "stupid, incompetent Americans" had killed her baby Frank. I found myself really glad that it was Prentiss with me and not Spencer, who would have completely freaked out. Prentiss just stood there, one arm on my wrist to stop me from moving, waiting for the girl to calm down.

After a few questions, it was evident that Yvonne had nothing to give us, so we thanked her for her time and left, dodging the porcelain vase she threw at us on our way out.

The drive back from the hotel the van den Burghs had been staying at was almost as quiet as the one from the bureau. I tried to pepper it with friendly jibes and encouragement about Spencer, but stopped when Prentiss stayed stony-faced.

I supposed it must be difficult, being in love with someone you worked with, seeing them everyday and knowing that they had no idea you ever thought of them as anything other than a colleague, feeling certain that they only ever thought of you that way too. Worried that one of you would get fired for the breach in policy if you ever said anything about it. Terrified that your performance in the field would deteriorate if you didn't. And then me… the way Prentiss had put it made me feel horribly guilty. _He seems to think that a seventeen-year-old girl can do my job better than I can._ I hoped that wasn't true. How could it be? Me, as good as them? Surely Spencer wasn't that stupid. And there was no way he could like me as anything other than a friend. She was definitely wrong about that. I started to feel sorry for her as I remembered Hotch's reprimand that morning. _I suggest that you work with her, Prentiss, rather than ignoring her like you did yesterday. You'll find you make more progress that way. _And if _she_ felt like that, how did Hotch feel? Why was he encouraging me, when I could see in his eyes that he didn't want me there at all?

"Don't worry," I said jovially as Prentiss pulled the car into a park under the bureau, "I won't say anything."

"You'd better not," she hissed, getting out of the driver's seat.

We met Spencer and JJ in the elevator, a wad of paper clutched in the former's hand. "Any luck?" JJ asked. Prentiss shook her head. "That's too bad."

"Have you two sorted out…" Spencer started.

"Oh, yes," I said happily, a wry smile spreading over my face. "We sorted it out, didn't we, Agent Prentiss?" I winked obviously. Prentiss gave me a murderous look as Spencer raised his eyebrows. The elevator arrived on our floor and we piled out. Hotch looked up.

"Tell me you've got something," he said pleadingly.

Prentiss sat down. "Yvonne van den Burg is very, _very_ upset. But she didn't see anything. She says Frank had his own plans for yesterday and she hardly saw him at all." Hotch sighed heavily. Spencer cleared his throat.

"I've got a list of recent activity around _HeartSick _from the library and from each bookshop in the area for the last two months, sir," he said. I grinned; his air of not being able to control when he supplied information was back. "I was just going to take them through to Garcia –"

"Let Clearwater do that," Gideon interrupted. "Clearwater, Garcia's office is two doors down the hall. Take those to her and tell her to cross-check them with everything she can find."

I nodded demurely. "Yes, sir." I had a feeling they wanted to talk about me. Spencer gave me a friendly grin as I took the sheaf of paper from his soft hands. Sure enough, as the glass door swung shut behind me, I heard Hotch's voice.

"Reid, what is Clearwater doing here?"

I forced myself to keep walking and not eavesdrop. Snatches of other teams' conversation hit my ears. Someone from behind a door called out, "Stacey, can I borrow your stapler?"

I froze. _Borrow._ Who had I lent the book to? I pressed it into everyone's hands. In the last two months… I racked my brain hard as I kept plodding slowly towards Garcia's office, but I couldn't remember lending it to anyone except Charisse lately. I'd been threatening to make her read it for months. I couldn't understand why she kept turning me down until she told me she'd finished it. White and shaking, she was, looking like she was about to throw up. "It isn't real, Char," I'd told her comfortingly.

"It could be," she'd replied.

And now it was. I reached the second door down the hall and stopped. _Penlope Garcia, Data Analyst._ I hefted the papers higher and knocked.

"Yuh-huh." I twisted the doorknob and entered the office.

"Wow." Computer screens and panels of buttons flashed down a me from all three of the walls I could see. It was a computer geek's fantasyland.

"You must be Juliette Clearwater." I looked around; a woman sat at a bigger screen on one wall. Her curly blonde hair was arranged in an amazingly crazy way and her clothes were so bright it almost hurt to look at her. I liked her immediately.

"Hi," I said, coming to stand behind her.

She spun around in her chair and blinked at me from behind equally colourful square glasses. "Morgan told me you were hot," she said delightedly.

I smiled, surprised. "He did?"

"Yeah. Oh – in a disconnected way, of course." The protectiveness that I'd heard on the phone yesterday began to show in her bright voice. I decided to try flattery.

"Of course. He likes _you_."

Her face brightened. "He does?"

I realized my mistake. "Oh, I'm sorry. I thought you two were dating." Her glittering eyes widened in innocence.

"Oh, no! We're just… I mean…" Her cheeks flushed.

"It's ok. I understand. Here," I put the records down in front of her. "These are records of all activity around _HeartSick_ for the past two months. Could you cross-check the names with… everything. Please." I added the plea on the end hopefully. She laughed.

"Of course." She picked up the first sheet of paper and began typing. "I could have got you this info in a heartbeat, you know," she said dismissively as she typed, "you didn't have to go around and ask them for it."

"I think Reid just wanted something to do," I said, finding another chair and sitting down next to her. I watched, my awe for this quirky woman growing as my eyes strained to keep up with the speed of her flying fingers.

"Nothing on that page," she said after barely a minute had passed.

"That was fast," I observed coolly.

"Fast? Come on, the network's moving at a snail's pace today. Next page."

On the fourth page, she found something. "Whoa… we got something. Bryan Cole, bought _HeartSick_ a month ago, has been arrested on two occasions for unnecessary violence and one for accomplice to murder…" her eyes widened, "and his brother was shot by the police task force on the scene of the murder. Juliette, call somebody, I think this is what they're looking for."

I didn't have anyone else's number, so I called Spencer. It was two rings before he picked up."Juju?"

"Hey, Spence. We got… hang on, I'll put you on speaker." I pressed the button.

"You got what?" his voice echoed in the narrow space.

"Bryan Cole bought the book a month ago," Garcia supplied. "He's got a bit of a record – two arrests for unnecessary violence and one for accomplice to murder. His brother died at the scene. Think he might be your guy?"

Spencer sighed. "We thought we were looking for a woman, but I guess he's worth a look."

Hotch's voice sounded; Spencer evidently had us on speaker too. "Thanks, Garcia. Clearwater, come back down now, I think we'd better wrap it up for the day." I tried to argue, but Garcia cut in over the top of me.

"Yes, sir. I'll be here whenever. Please, try to wait until it's light outside before you call me tomorrow, sir."

Gideon's throaty chuckle bubbled up through the speaker. "I'll try, Garcia. Make sure you go to bed early just in case."

"See you in a minute, sir," I said, and hung up. Garcia spun her chair around.

"Don't argue with Hotch over the phone," she advised. "He hates it, so you'll never win."

"How can he just tell us to go home now?" I said frustratedly. "We've actually got a lead, and if this guy's it, we're just letting him go! He's had a victim everuy day for the last three days, we could be killing somebody!"

Garcia sighed, stood up and opened the door for me. "I know, honey," she said sadly, "but you've been here thirteen hours already. It's been a long day. If you do this stuff when you're exhausted, it's dangerous."

I tried an acknowledging smile, and left through the door she was still holding open for me.

They were all packing up as I reached the door to the office. Prentiss pushed past me as I tried to open it. Without looking at me, she hurried down the corridor. I frowned. "See you tomorrow, Prentiss," I teasingly called after her. She turned back to shoot me a mistrusting look as a thought flicked through my head: _what if they've all decided I won't be here tomorrow?_

It was that look that made me realize that I was doing something I'd promised myself I'd never do. I was using what I knew as a weapon to get back at her for ignoring me. Suddenly disgusted with myself, I used a little more venom than necessary to push open the glass door, causing it to bang on the wall. Everyone stopped what they were doing to look up at me. I flinched. "Sorry."

I glanced up at the clock on the wall. 6o'clock. A flicker of panic leapt in my stomach. Where had the day gone? What had we used it to achieve?

At a look from Gideon, I decided not to argue to keep them here. They all looked exhausted. I supposed they weren't used to being called out at five in the morning.

As he moved past me to the door, Morgan clapped me on the shoulder. "See you tomorrow, Clearwater," he said genially. I was thrilled.

"Yeah," I said, smiling helplessly. Spencer threw his arm around my shoulders as he made his way towards the door, dropping my bag at my feet. I gave him a dirtly look, bending to pick it up. "Thanks," I said sarcastically.

His eyes widened innocently. "What?"

I laughed and finally threw my arms around him. "You're so cute!" I told him. He laughed too, a bit awkwardly, and pried me off him. "Sorry," I apologized.

He grinned and held the door open for me. "Don't worry," he replied neatly. "You do that to everyone. Can I give you a ride today?"

I nodded. "Charisse might actually take offence if I don't turn up again today," I told him. He chuckled.

"So what's the verdict on me?" I asked, trying to keep my voice cheerful. He frowned.

"What?"

"Don't give me that, Spencer, I know you were talking about me. What was the decision?"

"Oh," he suddenly sounded sheepish. "Well… I shouldn't have brought you. I knew that. But… Hotch thinks we need you because you know so much about _HeartSick,_ and Gideon wants to know more about the other book you said might be related to the case. Either way, they're not going to send you home. Prentiss wasn't happy about that. She's angry with me."

I thought about Prentiss. "Yeah. She's taken my being here as a personal insult. The other book? You mean _Draw Me A Star?_" He nodded. "Oh! It's a children's book. It's just about an artist who draws a star and then the star asks him to draw a sun, and etcetera, etcetera, until the moon asks for a star. It's just a kind of cyclic… that's why I still think it's revenge. What goes around, comes around, you know."

He mumbled assent. "And Cole's brother was shot by a police officer and nobody cared. That makes sense. Tell Gideon in the morning."

This time it took three tries before the mini started, but ten minutes later we pulled up outside my familiar flat, me still laughing at the look on his face the second time the car had stalled. I invited him inside, telling him Charisse would love to meet him. I wasn't actually sure if Charisse was home, but I said it anyway.

Luckily, as we reached the door it swung open, revealing my tiny but drop-dead gorgeous flatmate and her six-foot-three boyfriend.

I liked Andrew. He was a GP down at the local doctors and sweet as runny honey. I couldn't imagine him hurting anything bigger than a blowfly on purpose, with his soft sea-green eyes and auburn floppy hair. Today he was wearing a baby pink polo shirt that would have looked awful on any other guy, but just failed to clash horribly with his hair and instead brought out the yellow flecks in his eyes.

He stood back unobtrusively as Charisse bounced forward until she was practically on top of Spencer. "You must be Spencer," she said politely, extending her hand. I glanced at Andrew inquisitively; she was being too civil. He shrugged, looking laid-back as usual.

As soon as Spencer took her hand, she flipped his over and grabbed the other. "Good," she said in a satisfied way. "You're not married. Uju got involved with a married man about a year ago –"

"Char," I hissed, appalled. "I was _not_ involved with him! And I'm not _involved _with Spencer, either."

"Juju, I've told you a thousand times, I _saw_ him kiss you," she retorted stubbornly, ignoring the second part of what I'd said. "Come in, Spencer, have a cup of tea." He tried to refuse, but it was a demand not a request and she still held his hand in both of hers, so he had no chance.

"So, what happened with the married man?" Spencer asked teasingly as we sat down at the kitchen table. I scowled.

"Nothing. He worked in a publishing house, he told me he could show my writing to the right people. A few weeks later, he made a pass at me, _tried to kiss me in front of Charisse_, and when I turned him down, that was the end of it. Nothing ever happened."

Charisse plonked a mug of tea in front of us. "You told me you slept with him to make your writing go further," she said indignantly. Spencer, who had just taken a rather large gulp of tea, spat it out, somehow managing to get it the whole length of the kitchen table and all over Andrew's shirt. I laughed as he apologized profusely and Andrew waved it away, peeling off his shirt to reveal the faint lines of abs. I tried not to look. Charisse didn't.

"Well, you wouldn't believe me when I told you the truth, so I tried a more colourful version," I supplied easily. Charisse couldn't tear her eyes away from her boyfriend's torso.

"You didn't tell me you wrote," Spencer commented, taking a considerably smaller sip of tea. I shrugged.

"I write," I said unconcernedly.

"Can I read some?" he asked eagerly. I gave Charisse a _now-look-what-you've-done _look.

"You don't want to read that crap, Spence, honest," I dismissed. Charisse regally flicked a pretty hand in my direction.

"It's not crap, honey, it's brilliant! Give him one of the Tabitha Licroft things. He'd like those." She caught my _please-shut-up_ look. "Come on, Juju! You can't keep things from your boyfriend like that." I put my head in my arms and groaned in mock-despair.

"Charisse, Spencer _isn't_ my boyfriend! How many times?" I credited him for laughing instead of looking awkward like he would have yesterday. The boy learned fast.

"Oh, well, that's a shame, honey, because I was about to give you two my approval," she said, as though that clinched the matter.

"Oh, well, then, I'm sure she regrets the decision not to get involved with him," Andrew chipped in. He'd never go for direct, outright sarcasm, but he'd become very good at turning it into pacifying comments to calm Charisse down. I smiled at him and he winked his sparkling eyes back at me, gently setting down his mug. He pushed back his chair and stood up.

"Well, I'd better head home," he said, stretching. "Night, honey." Charisse stood up too, and what started out as a gentle goodbye peck on the lips quickly became a passionate embrace. I caught Spencer's eye and struggled not to laugh.

As soon as Andrew was out the door, which took longer than he'd anticipated, Spencer excused himself too. Charisse dashed up to my 'office' and came back with my latest manuscript. I flinched, but didn't stop him from taking it. I kind of wanted him to read it, especially that one. The one with the schizophrenic woman. I wanted him to like it. I pretended to grumble and turned down his offer of a ride to the bureau in the morning in favor of walking there myself. So he left, leaving Charisse and I alone at the kitchen table. I sighed and slumped onto the table, suddenly exhausted.

Charisse stroked my hair. "Oh, honey."

"I'm okay, Char. Just tired. Hey, did you lend _HeartSick_ to anyone when I gave it to you?" Her eyelids flickered briefly before she answered.

"Why would I lend _that_ to anyone else? Why do you ask?" I frowned. She hadn't exactly said no.

"Oh, just… the killer we're tracking seems to be copying Gretchen. We've got records of who's bought and borrowed it lately, but I can't help wondering if my habit of forcing it on everyone could have caused this mess…" I shook my head, suddenly fighting back tears. "Four people are dead, Char, and they all had husbands, irlfriends, families…" her face blanched and suddenly she looked close to crying herself. "What?"

"Don't blame yourself, Juju. I swear, I didn't lend that _thing_ to anyone – oh, but Andrew took it. He said it looked interesting. I don't know if he actually _read_ it, but – oh, don't look like that, Juliette. I swear to God Andrew didn't do any of this. Juliette? Are you listening to me?"

My face must have shown what was running through my mind. _Andrew_ had read the book. Andrew was a _doctor_. The morphine, the cauterized arteries, it all fit Andrew. But… Drew, a killer? Drew, who panicked that one time he accidentally put a teacup down on my pinky finger? _That_ didn't fit at all. I sighed again. "I know, Char. Does he still have it?"

"No, sweetie. It's back in your bookshelf. I think you should go to bed. You look exhausted, what time were you up this morning?"

"Four thirty," I replied, getting up and leaving her gaping at me, still sitting with her empty teacup at the table.

I read _HeartSick_ for half an hour before forcing myself to put it down and switch off my light. I shivered in the dark. Spencer's lounge hadn't been this pitch-black, and even though it usually comforted me, today it scared me slightly. I felt like I could hear the killer creeping up to my door, a killer that now, no matter how hard I tried to change it, bore Andrew's fine-boned face.

_Whatever you think this is going to be like,_ Gretchen had told Archie, _it's going to be much, much worse._

_

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**A/N: Any typos, I'm sorry. I'm only human, trying to type this darn thing up as fast as I can on a computer with the stupidest frigging keyboard you've ever seen. Once again, thanks to all my reviewers. It's actually my birthday today, so make it a good one by reviewing it? Please? Other than that... Merry Christmas everyone, 'cause you won't hear from me until after. Love you all.**

**-for you! **


	7. The Beauty Killer

**A/N: Here it is, chapter 7, in all its glory. **_**Chocolate fish **_**has acted as beta for this chapter so errors should be few and far between. We're halfway there, guys! (Total chapter count: 14.) Sorry to those of you who liked Drew. I didn't mean to make him quite so hot. Oh, and sorry about the bit at the end, but I couldn't help myself. If you don't like torture scenes, skip over the italics. You won't miss much. Adeiu! Oh, and please review? I quite appreciate them, you know.**

**-for you!

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**

Spencer Reid was glad to be rid of the unsettling quiet of his house when he arrived at the office at seven o'clock the next morning. He had spent most of the night before reading Juliette's manuscript, and the rest of the night trying to shake the haunting visions the thriller piece had given him. The squad they'd had placed at the drop spot had kept the unsub away overnight, so there were no new bodies that could throw up some kind of lead for them. Oddly enough, the first thing Juliette did when she arrived rosy-cheeked from the walk, was take Prentiss aside and apologise.

"What was that about?" Reid asked casually as she sauntered in.

"Oh, nothing," she deflected smoothly. "Morning, sir." Hotch nodded in response to the greeting. Reid struggled not to get frustrated.

"C'mon, Juju, you gotta tell me. You know me – I need to know everything."

She laughed easily. "Get used to disappointment, Spence. You can't know _everything_." She moved past him to sit down.

It nagged him until they left for Cole's suburban house. Then he drove it out of his mind.

Cole was a thickset man with a shaven head and numerous tattoos of dragons running up his muscular arms. Reid tried not to cower. If he really was their guy, it wasn't going to be easy. His hand found the cool of the gun strapped to his belt; he breathed in and out carefully, jibing himself for being so nervous.

Reid hated shooting people. He didn't do it often, but the few times necessity had left him no other choice, it haunted him for weeks afterwards. Still, the feel of the gun gave him cold comfort when faced with a thug like Bryan Cole. He flashed his badge. "FBI," he said levelly. "Mr. Cole, we need to ask you some questions."

Cole panicked inwardly. His eyes flickered past Reid and JJ, assessing how easily he could push past them should an escape prove necessary. JJ opened her jacket unconcernedly, making the gun in her holster obvious. "I wouldn't go that way, Mr. Cole," she said lightly. "We just want to ask about a book you bought recently. Can we come in, please?"

Cole took several deep breaths, his blue eyes still frantically searching for escape routes. "I don't understand," he said, finally stepping aside to let the two of them in. "I haven't done anything wrong."

They sat down companionably on his sofa. "Mr. Cole, records show that you bought a book called _Heartsick,_ by Chelsea Cain, about a month ago. Did you enjoy it, Mr. Cole?" JJ's voice sounded conversational, as though she were only in Cole's house for a cup of tea and a chinwag.

Cole now looked thoroughly confused. "I never read it," he said. "I bought it for my niece's birthday, two weeks ago."

Reid exchanged a glance with JJ. "Do you know if your niece has read it yet?"

"No. What is this about? What's so special about this book?" A subtle change in his posture: defensive. Cole was getting angry.

"Do you know what the book is about, Mr. Cole?" JJ's soft voice now sounded almost pitying.

"Yeah, it's a serial killer... thriller... book." He was uncertain now.

"Yes, it is, Mr. Cole, and somebody out there has decided that it's good enough to be real. Would you know anything about that?" Reid watched Cole's face carefully, but the only emotion that showed on it was surprise.

"What do you mean? Someone's kidnapping people and torturing them?"

"And killing them, yes," Reid finished. "Do you have any contact details for your niece?"

"Yes, but she's on holiday, so – wait, you think _Hannah_ did this?" Panic flew into Cole's brutish voice.

"At this point, it's possible," Reid said, "so, Mr. Cole, if you have a phone number that will work. We need it."

"You're crazy," Cole said flatly. "Hannah's in Tahiti. Her phone won't work. But she's a sweet girl – she wants to be an FBI agent, for Christ's sake! You think a girl like that would kill somebody?"

"Like I said, it's possible. Members of the police and FBI are just as likely to kill as anyone else." Reid explained patiently. "When did she go to Tahiti?"

"Yesterday," Cole supplied, now looking as though he was about to go into shock. "She's meant to come back tomorrow."

"There has been one body every day for the past three days, but there wasn't one this morning. Were you and your niece close?"

"Yes. My wife used to look after her a lot."

"Your wife?"

Cole sighed. "She left. Last time I saw her was at Hannah's 21st."

Reid leaned forwards, like he always did when something got interesting. "How long ago was that?"

"Six years."

"Well, Mr. Cole, the fact that the murders stopped in your niece's absence, coupled with your relationship with her given your criminal record, and the fact that she has most likely read the book, means that she fits our profile almost exactly."

"What's Hannah's last name?" JJ added quickly.

"Kessler."

"And she'll be back from Tahiti tomorrow? What time tomorrow?" prompted JJ. He told them; they thanked him and left him sitting on his sofa, his head in his hands, looking lost and helpless.

"Garcia? Everything you've got on Hannah Kessler." There was a brief pause at the other end of Reid's phone. While he was waiting for her to reply, the two of them reached the spot where the rest of the team stood.

"Hannah Kessler is Bryan Cole's niece, yes?"

"Yeah. Anything else?"

"She's in Tahiti?" Reid rolled his eyes.

"We knew that too, Garcia. Left yesterday, comes back tomorrow. Anything we don't already know?"

"Ooh, a challenge," Garcia purred. "Uh, she's in her second year of FBI training, 27 years old, _really_ gorgeous, holds down a weekend job at a CD store, parents are divorced, both lawyers, quite high up... I can send you a picture if you'd like." She said all of that very fast. Reid took a second to process it.

"Slightly better, thanks," he said, "photo would be great."

"Coming through." Reid put the phone down briefly, but didn't hang up.

"Sir, Garcia's putting through a photo of Cole's niece, Hannah Kessler. He gave her the book two weeks ago. She fits the profile perfectly, but she's in Tahiti."

Hotch turned to look at the laptop perched on top of the car. "Why are we bothering if she's in Tahiti, Reid? She can't murder people _here_ from over there."

"Because, sir, she left yesterday and comes back tomorrow." He put the phone back up to his ear. "Nearly there, Garcia?"

"Just waiting for your okay. Be on your screen in four... three... two... bingo."

A driver's license photo flashed up on the laptop screen. Reid took a sharp breath in; beside him, Juliette gasped.

"Wow, Garcia, gorgeous was an understatement." Kessler had silky straight ash-blond hair and huge clear blue eyes. She wasn't pretty or 'hot' or even gorgeous; she was _beautiful_, in a grown-up, mature way that somehow sent alarm bells spinning through his head.

Garcia thought this was funny. "Ooh, Reid, is this possibly your fist crush since high school?" He ignored her.

"She's.... she's exactly how I'd imagined Gretchen," Juliette said shakily.

Cold washed over Reid, making him shiver. _That _was why Kessler's beauty scared him. Cain had described Gretchen as 'maturely beautiful' and the first words that had leapt into his mind when he looked at Kessler had been 'mature' and 'beautiful'.

It was spooky. Reid hated spooky cases, cases where he felt completely out of control, like a fly caught in a net where a big fat spider was slowly, slowly, twitching him closer. The last case like that had been Tobias Hankel.

And everyone in the bureau knew _that_ hadn't gone well. It had changed him, more than he wanted anyone to see. He still lived in the memories, at night when he could finally let down his guard. How the stars had sparkled like the lights in the club they had been called away from, framed by the rushes in the night, and then he'd heard JJ scream and suddenly there was a gun at his head and nothing he could do but wait while Hankel's two personalities argued over his fate…

Words drifted back into Reid's mind: "…lost in that big scary brain of his… Spencer? _Spencer?_"

He jerked back into himself. "Sorry, sir."

Hotch sighed. "That's all right, Reid. Do I need to repeat what I just said?"

Reid cringed. "Yes, please, sir."

"I said, we should go back to the bureau and discuss what to do from there," Hotch repeated. "We can't do anything about Kessler until she gets back tomorrow. If we do something before then, we'll spook her and it'll be out-of-state so we'll have no jurisdiction. So we head back." Reid nodded.

As they got back into the car, Juliette put a hand on his arm. "Are you okay?" she asked softly. He nodded again.

"I hate not being ahead," he said. "Not being absolutely 100% in control of the situation."

She smiled sympathetically. "I usually love it," she said thoughtfully. "But people's lives are paying for it here. That's less exhilarating."

He sorted vacantly. "When you're here, you learn to like being in control."

Morgan, sitting in the front seat while Gideon drove, snorted too. "Yeah, because when you're not in control, you're one step away from being dead."

Reid saw Juliette's face. "He's kidding, Juju," he assured her.

She gave him a cynical look. "I'm not that stupid," she said.

He had to agree, you'd have to be stupid to believe that.

* * *

The next morning brought no new bodies, and the sight of the empty alleyway left Reid feeling better than he had since he'd first met Juliette. He hadn't had a good night; Hankel had haunted him relentlessly, now accompanied by the beautiful figure of Hannah Kessler, laughing at him and calling him Archie no matter how hard he tried to tell them that his name was Spencer and he hadn't done anything wrong. _Shoot him, son, he's one of them FBI devils… _he'd pleaded with them, asking them what they wanted.

_It's you, Archie. It's always been you._

He'd woken, gasping, to the harsh grating of his alarm clock, but the dream had failed to wash away with the hot shower, hotter than usual in a vain attempt to scald away the memories. The cool metal of his razor had done nothing to remove them, either, nor had his palm colliding with his cheek as he absently let the blade drift closer to his wrists…

They met Bryan Cole outside the arrivals gate at the airport. He really didn't look like a serial killer, Reid mused, just like an ex-thug now struggling to straighten out his life. The look on his face when he'd been told that his gift and his criminal record made his niece a suspect –

Not a suspect, Reid corrected himself. A killer. He looked up as the arrival gate opened and passengers began filing through; Hannah Kessler was, of course, one of the last to leave the plane. Hotch approached her; she looked straight past him and her beautiful face split into a smile as she saw Cole. "Miss Kessler?" Her attention was finally captured by Hotch.

"Yes," she confirmed. Hotch nodded and flashed his badge.

"We need you to come with us."

"Why?" Her response was quick; too quick, gauged Reid. He stepped forward. Hotch indicated the book she still clutched in he arms.

"Are you enjoying your book, Miss Kessler?" he asked. Her full lips opened and closed, but she didn't say anything as Morgan produced a pair of handcuffs. "We're arresting you on suspicion of the murders of Jacob Montgomery, Rebecca Green, Stephanie Palmer and Frank van den Burgh. You have the right to remain silent; however, anything you do say may be used as evidence against you in court. You have the right to a lawyer should you request one…"

Reid watched, impassive, as Hotch and Morgan led a protesting Kessler away, and Cole stood still behind them, crying softly at what had happened to his darling niece, because of him. It was all rather anticlimactic, he thought, after all the time they'd spent getting this far. But arrests often were, and he gave it no further thought.

* * *

The BAU thought they were close to getting a confession in the interrogation room at ten o'clock the next morning, when somebody rang in to report the Beauty Killer's fifth victim.

"_What?_" Juliette said desperately as Hotch put the phone down, looking grim. "That's impossible! We've got Kessler here; she's been here all night!"

Gideon sat down heavily. "So Kessler's not the Beauty Killer," he said.

"Or she's not working alone," Morgan added hopefully.

Reid nodded. "Gretchen used men she found on an online dating service. Sometimes she made them kill for her." Gideon, however, was shaking his head.

"They didn't do anything while she was in Tahiti," he said resignedly. "Why would they start now? Any accomplices would just think she'd extended her stay."

"So we're back to the beginning _again?_" Juliette asked. Reid bit his lip at the bitter, desperate note to her voice.

"Not quite," Hotch comforted. "Garcia didn't check the whole list of people ho bought the book. There are heaps of possible on there. And the latest body might give us something."

"What if they're not on the list?" Juliette sighed in a confessional way. Reid sat down opposite her and Gideon sat up straighter. She knew something. "I lent my copy to my flatmate, Charisse. She says her boyfriend borrowed it. I didn't want to say anything because I was so sure it was Kessler, but… he's a doctor."

For the second time in two days, Reid felt his blood go cold and the hairs on the back of his neck stand up. "You're saying… you think it was _Andrew?_"

"No," she said, sounding mere inches away from breaking down into tears. "Andrew wouldn't hurt a fly. He put a cup down on my finger once, and absolutely panicked before he realized he hadn't hurt me. But… everything else fits."

Reid put his head in his hands. He'd missed it. Again.

* * *

_The candlelight flickers eerily on the rough stone walls, lighting them up gruesome shades of orange and grey, gleaming stains of something thick and dark and wet dripping in tendrils down them. _

_The victim is too tired to feel scared. Whatever the stranger had filled the syringe that had pierced the crook of the victim's elbow with, it had made the victim drowsy with the absence of the pain the stranger had carefully, almost lovingly inflicted on the victim after winning the victim over. It hadn't taken long; the stranger was attractive and the victim was weak in that respect._

_The sedative begins to thin in the victim's blood and shadows of the pain return, throbbing and puling through the victim's bared chest. The victim begins to shudder with the memory of the stranger's face bending over the harsh stone floor that the victim had been tied down to, the cold nail pressed lightly against the victim's chest, a hammer lit up by the flaring candles raised higher and higher and then brought down until the iron pierced flesh; the victim's scream, echoing horribly in the enclosed space; then the syringe had appeared like a gift from Heaven and the victim had floated into blissful unconsciousness._

_A chink of light pierces the victim's eyes and they squeeze closed of their own accord to shut out the needle of brightness. The candles gutter in a breath of fresh air that the victim feels whisper over the exposed skin like the lips of the stranger, like the victim had wishfully imagined that they would when the light of day left the two of them alone._

_Instead, this. The victim hears a light footstep as the stranger enters the room. This is not the mindless bliss the victim had anticipated a night with the stranger would be._

_A slight _click_ sounds the disappearance of the knife-edge of light as the door closes softly. The victim begins to shake; slowly, slowly, sight returns as the victim's tired eyes slide open. Liquid candlelight slides down a scalpel blade inches from the victim's eyes; the victim half-expects it to drip right off the end like molten wax and burn out the insides of the victim's eyes. _

"Hello, darling," _the stranger says, in a voice silky and lilting. "_Did you miss me?_" The victim dares not reply as the stranger lowers the scalpel._

_The impressions hurt, but not as much as the still-throbbing wounds on the victim's chest and the stubs of three missing fingers on the victim's left hand. The stranger's mesmerizing eyes leap with reflected candlelight as the scalpel dances carelessly across the victim's stomach, avoiding the burn marks left weeping from where the stranger had carefully held the candles close to the victim's skin. _

_Finally the scalpel clatters on the stone floor and lies forgotten. The victim cannot breathe a sigh of relief, however, because the stranger now revels in the grating noise of steel on stone as the stranger slowly picks up a carving knife from beside the victim's head and raises it. _

_The victim's screams echo sickeningly in the cellar and the stench of the victim's own blood fills both occupants' nostrils. The knife rises and falls, again and again until the victim's throat stings with the force of the screams that continue to rip from it. Then the knife, too, clatters away._

"_Please," the victim moans, "please, let that be the end… please, no more…"_

_The stranger laughs, a high, breathless sound that would usually send thrills up and down the victim's spine, but now chills the blood pouring with each heartbeat into the empty space where the victim's arm had been a minute ago. _"But I'm not finished,"_ the stranger says with another laugh. "_There's so much more fun we can have together."

_The victim screams again as burning, white-hot pain lances up the wound as the stranger presses something searing with heat into the stub of the victim's shoulder. The screams subside into choked sobs of anguish, of confusion, of despair. "Why are you doing this to me?" the victim coughs out._

_The laugh sounds again, high, amused. _"Because it's fun,"_ the stranger taunts. The cautery iron is set aside in its turn. _Please,_ the victim thinks, _please, let it be over… _but the stranger still isn't finished. The victim's chokes and sobs grow louder, ringing cacophonously around the cellar, bouncing repetitively off the stone walls and the victim's tortured, sharpened ears. _

_The stranger picks up the still-dripping nail from the floor and waves it teasingly above the victim's head. _No, please,_ the victim tries to plead, but the words won't come. The stranger gently places the tip of the nail on the victim's lowest rib and shifts the hammer in the other hand. The victim's eyelids slam tightly closed and the victim breathes faster and faster, even the blond hair hanging limp on the floor shaking, waiting for the _slam_ and the blinding agony as the nail smashes through flesh and bone and sinew to feel as though it splinters the victim's very heart._

_But it doesn't come. The victim's eyelids open again to the stranger's tinkling laughter. _"I'm sorry, darling," _the stranger says, stroking the exposed, tingling flesh around the point of the nail. _"Did I scare you?"

_Then, without warning, the stranger strikes. Driving the nail deep through splintering bone, flesh and muscle; igniting every fiber of the victim's body in searing, white-hot agony. The victim gasps and chokes as the stranger repositions the nail, higher this time, to a patch of flesh tender from the impact of the last stroke, and strikes again. The victim cries out, so hard that something deep at the back of the victim's throat tears and the victim can cry no more._

_For a third time, the hammer rises and falls, but this time the victim cannot scream; blood escapes from between the victim's lips, along with a limp moan as the sharpened point of the bloody nail pierces the victim's lung and blood begins to pool inside it; the victim tries to take a breath in but the air seems immobile, unable to fill the broken lung, and the victim gasps and chokes, drowning slowly in copious pools of the victim's own blood._

_The last glimpse of the stranger that the victim sees is a flash of hair, glowing auburn in the candlelight.

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**A/N: Okay, I hadn't realized how many times I would have to write 'the victim' to do that that way. Sorry. I have a computer now, but no internet, so updates should be a little faster. I've finished drafting the whole story; I mentioned that before, didn't I? Ok. So, yeah. I'll, uh, see you guys later. Thanks for all the reviews! (**_**Sue1313**_**…)**

**-for you.**


	8. Intervention

**A/N: Quick? The wonderment of friends with broadband, dahling. One again brilliantly beta'ed and put up by **_**chocolate fish**_**. Thanks a bundle, dearie.**

**-for you!

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I woke gasping, choking in the quiet of my bedroom, and, with some difficulty, pushed my blankets away from my face.

"Juju, I think this BAU thing is bad for you. This is the third morning in a row you've woken up screaming."

I screamed again, more to prove a point than in fright at finding Charisse's face inches from mine. The three days and two victims since 15-year-old Anne Murphy's murder had proved Hannah Kessler innocent hadn't been kind to my dreams.

Three days and two victims since Andrew's sea-green eyes and auburn hair turned them into nightmares. After I'd panicked, Gideon had taken Prentiss and rushed to question him, returning with an affirmation of his innocence. I suppose it goes to show how much of an angel he was that he didn't get angry at me for just assuming.

Charisse did. She sat at the kitchen table, yelling and screaming at me that she had _told_ me Andrew wasn't a killer, and how dare I run blabbing to the FBI, and how could I possibly think it was him anyway, he was the complete antithesis of any kind of serial killer, and usually I would have congratulated her on using a big word like antithesis but for some reason her niggling made me think of the first time I learned to ride a bike, with my father screaming that I was useless, and Mom just standing there looking sad, and that was the last thing she ever did with me, so suddenly I sat down and burst into tears.

It wouldn't have been so terrible if Andrew hadn't chosen that moment to walk in the door, see me sitting at the kitchen table bawling my eyes out, and come straight over to comfort me.

"Juju, what's wrong?" he'd said, rubbing my shoulders and shooting Charisse a reprimanding look that _she_ wasn't in his position.

"I'm s-sorry, Drew." I sobbed on his shoulder. "I didn't mean to bring the FBI down on you –"

"Don't be ridiculous, Juju," he said firmly, pulling out a chair beside me. "Agent Gideon said you'd told them you were sure it wasn't me but he just had to be 100%."

I'd sniffed and wiped my eyes. "You're an angel, Drew," I'd told him. He'd smiled.

"But you're _my_ angel," Charisse had said possessively, claiming his hand with her own. A tiny twinge of the jealousy I'd felt when they first got together had returned.

"Yes," he'd said, squeezing her hand gently. "I'll always be yours. It'd take more than two FBI agents to take you away from me."

She'd jumped up and hugged him tightly. "I hope so," she'd whispered into his shoulder. "I hope so."

After that, Andrew hadn't stopped featuring in my dreams, only now a stony-faced Gideon and a leering Prentiss pulled him off me as I struggled to breathe, drowning in my own blood, and dragged him away while he screamed helplessly for Charisse.

Now she sat next to my bed, looking dead concerned as she told me I looked sick. "I'm fine, Char," I told her. "And I'll sleep better when this Beauty Killer is rotting in prison." She flinched and I sighed and got up, yanking my legs out of my twisted hollows of blankets they were stuck in.

"I'll sleep easier when you're not with the BAU," she replied bitterly, making her way out. She stopped at the door. "I'll see you tonight," she said, then sighed. "Unless you'd rather sleep at your not-boyfriend Spencer's house again."

I blinked. It was Monday. That meant that this, this twisted roller-coaster ride with the BAU, had been going on for more than a week. Eight days and four victims, right under my nose. I sighed.

"No, Char, I'll be home," I said. "I'll see you tonight." She nodded and left.

I found myself unconsciously stalling, carefully picking out clothes to wear and pouring cereal for breakfast instead of taking toast out the door with me. In the three days since Kessler, progress at the BAU had ground to a complete halt. Everything had dried up; no-one on the rest of the list held any kind of criminal record past minor shoplifting, or a job that would give them any kind of medical experience, access to morphine, or knowledge of cautery. The three bodies gave us nothing but names and grieving relatives; Anne Murphy, Charles Hudson and Devon Miller were all just ordinary people, students, poets, athletes. The only thing they had in common was that they were all found dead in the same alleyway with the same marks on their bodies, right down to the same bloody, eight-pointed star on their right hip.

I didn't want to go back to the dead space full of lost people and emptiness that the BAU office had become. I wanted the place where JJ had laughed with me; where even Hotch had joined in teasing Spencer about the fact that his gun was exactly the same size as Morgan's; where Morgan had seemed happy at the thought of tomorrow and Garcia had told me I was hot; where people had time to care about each other, rather than wasting it pretending to do something but getting nothing done. But that place seemed long gone. And what fully-trained FBI agent would want a motivational speech form a seventeen-year-old? The truth was, now that the BAU was no longer fun, I was bored and I wanted out. That disturbed me a little. What if I couldn't stick it out working there? My application to train to join the bureau lay unfinished on my desk, and suddenly I was wondering if I should really complete it.

But after I'd hand-washed and dried my cereal bowl and tried on all the different outfits one could sensibly try on in one morning, my nightmare had still left me enough time for a comfortable amble down to the bureau. I tried to slap myself in the face, but chickened, shook my head really hard instead, and opened the front door.

The wind slapped my face for me, finally shaking away the stupor I seemed to have been moving in and at the same time giving me an excuse to go back inside and grab a scarf. Back on my doorstep, I waited a moment.

The sky was cloudy; it looked like it was going to rain, and suddenly I wondered if the world had always been this grey. All the colour that I used to see in the world seemed to have been drained out. I looked down at myself and realized I was wearing black shoes and black skinny jeans under a grey tunic and black jacket. I'd tried on almost all of the colour I owned and discarded it in favor of black and grey. My scarf, hot pink and lime green in bold stripes with blue bobbles, stood out like a bruised thumb and really didn't go with the rest of the outfit.

Oh well. I took a deep breath and stepped back out into the wind. I'd been walking for about ten minutes when I heard something behind me. It sounded like a car horn with a cold. I turned around, and, sure enough, Spencer's beat-up old Mini rolled to a stop beside me and he pushed open the passenger door. I got in.

"Morning," I said, as brightly as I could muster. He smiled.

We sat in silence for a minute and the lethargy began to creep over me. "I wasn't going to come today," I voiced eventually.

He looked at me. "What?"

I sighed. "Nothing's happening, Spencer. You guys are all so lost – and I don't blame you!" I added quickly, "I blame _me_. I come in here and suddenly you guys don't work so well together. Prentiss starts a one-man show without us, and _everyone_ looked down on you for a while –"

"For a while," echoed Spencer. "But you sorted it out. Prentiss. Morgan. Hotch. Now you're just like another part of the team."

"But you never needed another part of the team," I argued. "Have you ever heard that too many cooks spoil the broth?"

"Have you ever heard that many hands make light work?" he shot back. "Don't believe those sayings, Juju. They're just a load of crap – people trying to justify stuff."

"There's a moral to every story, Spencer, so they say. This hasn't been 'light work'. So there are too many hands. And Prentiss only puts up with me because I figured out a… a secret that she doesn't want out."

He watched me for a while, evidently judging whether I was about to spill said secret. When I said nothing, he sighed. "So why'd you come back?" he asked dejectedly.

I sighed too, pulling my knees up to my chest. "Because I'm vain," I told him weakly. "I want you to like me. I didn't think you would if I didn't turn up."

"I couldn't not like you," he said, but nothing else; not 'you're right, though' or 'you'd be wrong to give up."

When we arrived at the BAU office we found Prentiss and JJ sitting at the table with an older, wiry woman, her graying blonde hair pulled into a tight French bun, looking strict and imposing. Spencer walked through the door, spotted her, and froze.

"Madam Strauss?" he sounded utterly bewildered. "What are you doing here?" She looked around.

"Dr. Reid, it's good to see you again," she said, coming to stand by us, smiling a smile that didn't reach her eyes. She waited for him to return the compliment. When he didn't, she sat down again. "I'm waiting for Agent Hotchner. There are some serious problems with the way this unit is being run."

Spencer looked as if he was struggling not to roll his eyes. "Wait, Hotch isn't here yet? It's not like him to be late."

"Actually, Reid, you're early," JJ interrupted. She gave him a 'here-she-goes-again' look behind Strauss' back.

"You look surprised," I teased him. "Like it's not like you to be early?"

Strauss noticed me for the first time. "Who is this?" she asked sternly, her blue eyes narrowing into crow's feet. I extended a hand.

"Juliette Clearwater, mam." I heard Morgan's voice behind me, teasing the faint echoes of Garcia's fading down the hallway. She looked at my hand as though I'd spat on it before I offered it to her. I dropped it.

"On whose authority are you here?" I started to get nervous as I thought about this.

"Uhhh…"

"Mine." The door swung shut behind Hotch with a soft _click_. I grinned. It was the perfect melodramatic hero's entrance; I could almost hear the _Indiana Jones_ theme playing in the background. Strauss looked outraged.

"Agent Hotchner, this is the FBI. You of all people should know that it is no place for school trips."

Hotch remained calm. He came to stand next to me. "Miss Clearwater is an expert on the book we believe the unsub is copying. She has been a great help to the investigation." I found myself glowing, and tried to wipe the goofy smile off my face before Strauss began to think I was clinically insane.

"Agent Hotchner, your badge is already in jeopardy," Strauss said in a dangerously quiet voice. "Two unjustified arrests have been made in the past eight days. I received a formal complaint from Angelique Thompson –" my heart sank as I saw Hotch's do the same – "saying that you burst into her house while she was grieving for her boyfriend's death, arrested her and unjustly accused her of his murder, along with the murder of two women, one of whom she had never even _heard_ of before, without supporting evidence. In what world is that acceptable, Agent Hotchner?"

Hotch sighed heavily. "Mam, we had a theory and Miss Thompson fit our profile exactly. She refused to come to the door, so we searched the house and when we found her inside, took her into custody. At the time, we believed her to be guilty. When we discovered otherwise, we released her immediately. She was hardly here for half an hour."

"Agent Hotchner," Strauss repeated yet again; I began to think she rather liked his name. "You had no solid evidence to arrest Miss Thompson or Miss Kessler. I have spoken to you before about the reckless way that your team works and I rather thought I would be listened to."

Hotch hung his head. "Yes, Mam. It won't happen again."

Strauss pursed her thin lips. "It had better not. Remember what happened the last time you went too far, Agent Hotchner." _There she goes again with the name, _I thought.

"What happened, Mam?" We all turned around to see that Gideon had arrived. He had that look in his eye; that smile that I absolutely loved about him, that slightly manic, crazed, possessed smile, with fires leaping from his eyes. Indiana Jones was having a field day in my head. "You tried to get rid of Agents Hotchner and Prentiss and look – they're both still here." The glint in his eye intensified as he held out a hand to the woman, who I now placed as the section chief, looking furious. "Madam Strauss."

"Agent Gideon," she returned stiffly, taking the proffered hand gingerly. "I was referring to the fact that two people ended up dead without reason."

"It was the right thing to do with the knowledge that we had, Mam," Hotch put in wearily, sounding as though they had had this argument before.

"Not by the rule book, it wasn't," Strauss said sternly.

"With respect, Mam, the rule book isn't all that matters in the field," Morgan asserted. Strauss looked as if she would dearly like to hit him, but I couldn't imagine her exerting physical force. She struck me as the kind of person who used authority to do more damage than fists could ever manage. I guessed that the case they were all talking about hadn't ended well for Hotch.

"Mam, I understand your concern, but we do actually have a killer we're trying to catch, so if you'll excuse us," Gideon said boldly. "It was a pleasure to see you, Madam Strauss."

She glared at him. "The same for you, Agent Gideon," she said coldly. I would have laughed at the contradiction if it wasn't so serious, and I wasn't trying to escape her notice; she seemed to have forgotten about me. "And remember, Agent Hotchner, that although the rule book may not be the _only_ thing that matters, that does not mean you can disregard it completely." Hotch nodded, and I let out the breath I'd been holding in as she made as if to leave.

Then she stopped. "You haven't told me what _she_ is doing here," she said, jerking her head towards me. Spencer put a hand on my shoulder protectively.

"We believe the unsub is copying a character from a book. Juliette has read the book in question a number of times and she was just helping us to predict the unsub's next move." Strauss frowned.

"You're supposed to be a genius, Dr. Reid. Are you telling me you haven't even _touched_ the book yourself?" Spencer flushed.

"Of course, Mam, I've read it, but –"

"Then why do you need a schoolgirl as well?" Spencer blinked. I had to agree with Strauss, I didn't belong there. Spencer had read the book and Gideon started to read it yesterday. So what did they need me for? I was only slowing them down with comments sending them after people like Andrew.

"I've _read_ it, Mam, but Juju lives and breathes it. I only read it because she identified that the unsub was following it. Without her, we'd still be clueless."

"Juju?" Strauss repeated incredulously. "Dr. Reid, what is your relationship with this girl?"

Spencer appeared speechless for a minute. "We… we're friends, Mam, but that's not the point! The point is, if it weren't for her, we'd be nowhere."

That wasn't entirely true, I thought. Suddenly it all seemed point_l__ess_. "No, Spencer," I said sadly, "Strauss is right."

He turned to me in surprise. "What? Are you saying we would still be here if you hadn't identified that the wounds were from nails and linked that back to _Heartsick?"_

"Yes." His eyes widened. "Honestly, Spencer, the only thing that would have changed is that you never would have arrested Hannah Kessler. I don't belong here, and none of you really _want_ me here. I should have left ages ago." I turned and went to trudge dejectedly out of the room.

Hotch was standing in my way, looking down on them with his sternest face. "You're right, Clearwater," he said firmly, bringing tears up near the surface. "I don't want you here. But we need you here and I think that this is good for you. I will not just stand here and watch you leave this case behind you."

I knew he was only saying it to stand up to Strauss, but it almost brought tears to my eyes. Not enough to make me stay, though. _I_ couldn't look weak either. I wasn't that kind of person. "Thank you, sir," I said quietly, "that means a lot. It's been amazing. Working with all of you has been an honor." Clichéd endings had always been my style.

I sidestepped him, and left. Just like that. I hadn't dropped my bag as we came in because of Strauss, so I could successfully, dramatically stride from the room and not turn around as I heard the _click_ of the glass door closing behind me for the last time.

And opening again. "Juju, wait!" I should've known, even though Hotch couldn't do anything with Strauss there, Spencer would have something to say. He always did. I'd read somewhere that the average woman uses 7000 words every day and the average man, 2000. Well, Spencer talked more than I did, and I was sure that I used more words than average.

I turned around, hands on hips. "Don't think you can stop me, Spencer."

He looked around surreptitiously. "Just hear me out, Juju. Please." I felt like crying again. Why was it so hard to do what I knew was the right thing? Why wouldn't they just let me go? I gave him an 'it-had-better-be-good' look. He gestured that we should go back into the office.

"Spencer, I'm not going back in there. Whatever you've got to say, say it here." He shook his head and pulled me into a huge, empty briefing room opposite the office.

"Soundproof. If I say what I'm going to say where Strauss can hear, I'll be in trouble."

I sat on the table impatiently, realized I probably shouldn't sit on tables in an FBI briefing room, pulled out a chair and sat on it like my old English teacher had, my feet resting on the seat.

He took a deep breath. "Why are you leaving, Juliette? Don't listen to Strauss. She's just a bully. She says these things, but she doesn't mean them."

I sighed. "She's right, Spence. You don't need me. I'm holding you up. I don't belong here! I'm not an 'agent' or a 'doctor'. I'm just me. I was kidding myself. I'm not ready for this."

"You heard Hotch, though, he wants you here. He said you were 'a great help'!"

"Spencer, he only said that because Strauss was there. What have I done for this case? _Honestly!_ All the decisions I made – I thought it was a woman, which led us to Thompson. I thought they were copying Gretchen, which led us to Kessler. Everything Strauss was accusing Hotch of was _my fault._ I was just playing a game, pretending to be something I'm not, and now I realize how dangerous this game is. I'm the toddler trying to play Jenga, Spencer. I'm just lucky that the tower hasn't fallen over yet. Now I'm getting out before I take out one too many." Not my most elegant speech ever.

"This isn't a Jenga game, Juliette."

"No, Spencer. It's much worse than that."

He stared at me, his eyes so wide I felt like I was falling into them. I thought I saw tears fill them, but convinced myself I'd imagined it before he spoke. "I don't want to lose you."

I almost sighed, and then stopped myself. I'd done it so much today I felt oxygen-deprived. "I'm not saying that we can't be friends, Spence, of course not! I wouldn't lose your friendship for the world!" I ran to him, knocking over the chair, and hugged him tightly. He clutched at me, sniffing desperately to keep the tears from flowing.

"I don't want you to go." I let go of him. It felt so strange, he was trying desperately not to cry and I just didn't care anymore. Then I heard what he'd said, and suddenly I was fighting back tears so hard it hurt my sinuses.

"I don't want to go either," I said, my voice stupid with imprisoned emotion, "but it's just selfish. We've been so selfish, Spencer, can't you see that? People are dying and we're sitting here pretending that things wouldn't be different if I wasn't here! We've been completely blind – you!" I jabbed, my voice rising, suddenly angry. "You're supposed to be the micro-expression genius and you can't even see that Prentiss is in love with you!" He suddenly stopped his incoherent stuttering and his soft, dark eyes widened. I became aware that tears were streaming down my face and I wiped them away angrily. "Well, I've had enough of being blind. I've had enough of being selfish, Spencer, and if I leave, you guys will be able to have an idea without having to slow down and explain it to me. I'm leaving. Please," I implored, lowering my voice again. "Just let me go." He made no move to stop me; he just sat there, motionless, his chocolate eyes wide, looking lost and helpless in a way that made me want to throw my arms around him and hug him so tight he couldn't breathe.

But I couldn't do that. I threw open the glass door, passed JJ and Morgan and Hotch and Prentiss and Gideon and Strauss all standing there with their mouths open, and I ran.

* * *

**A/N: Yup. It's over. But it's not finished! Tune in… sometime later for the next thrilling installment of **_**Draw Me A Star,**_** the chapter fic that's holding people all over the world spellbound, desperate to find what will happen next! Next week: Spencer Reid visits the library and has a spine-chilling realization about the case that has the whole team marching around in circles. Thanks for reading, folks, and that concludes this week's show! ****A bientôt****, Goodnight everyone! **

**-For you.**


	9. The End Of The World

**A/N: Hoorah, am fast-updating genius, with a sneaking suspicion she may be something of a whizz in the kitchen as well! (he/she who names source of quote receives praise next update) And here it is! The beginning of the end! Well, I suppose that really started last chapter, didn't it… oh well. Enjoy!**

**-for you.**

* * *

The quiet of the room was driving him mad. Spencer Reid put his pen down and massaged his temples. He didn't have a headache, but his mind was buzzing with so much distraction he felt like maybe if he pressed his head, some of the thoughts might pop out somewhere, like squeezing a stone fruit.

It didn't work, and Reid was overcome by a feeling that he was suffocating. He needed air, needed to get away from the team shooting pitying looks his way or, in Prentiss' case, not looking at him at all. He needed to think, to separate things in his mind so they didn't roll around in his brain like a Catherine Wheel firework, burning anyone who wasn't paying attention.

Even Strauss' mouth had been open when he came back, having watched Juliette storm out. Reid had wanted to slap her. She did this; it was her fault Juliette had gone.

He'd taken a deep breath, willing himself to calm down. Juju would be back by tomorrow, when she realised that she belonged there. He'd hardly caught what Strauss had said as she left.

"I'm sorry, Reid," Hotch had said heavily.

He'd shaken his head. _Pull it together_. "It's okay, sir," he'd replied heavily. "She'd been talking about leaving for a while. She said –"

"We know what she said," Prentiss had interrupted quietly, determinedly avoiding his eye. "She was shouting. We could hear it."

_Prentiss is in love with you._ That was it, the big secret. The reason Prentiss put up with Juliette. Was it true? He'd glanced up at Hotch, who looked as though he was thinking the same thing.

"Right," Gideon had said sharply. "Well, I found these records of people who live in the alley by the drop spot. It's a long shot, but I think Garcia should see them."

"I'll take them through," Reid had offered.

As the door to Garcia's office had opened in front of him, the analyst's voice had drifted out to greet him. "You'd better have something good to give me, sister."

"Do I need a haircut that badly?" he'd joked weakly, stepping inside the office. Garcia had turned around.

"Reid! I was expecting your gorgeous new best friend. Where's Juliette?"

Reid had blown out his cheeks. "She left, Garcia. Strauss made her… well, you know Strauss."

"Wish I didn't," Garcia had said lightly. "Well, I'll miss her."

"Yeah," he'd sighed, sitting down and throwing the records onto the keyboard. "Me too."

Garcia had looked at him, smiling, kissed her fingertips and pressed them to his forehead. "You'll be okay."

"Thanks, Garcia."

The exchange had only made him feel worse. Reid sent himself up, pushing his chair back from the table. "Sir, can I be excused for a bit? I want to go check something." Hotch looked up at him and nodded, giving him the smallest of sympathetic smiles.

It was raining outside, not hard enough to require a coat or umbrella, but just a little bracing dampness in the atmosphere. Reid gulped in great breaths of air as though he'd been seconds away from drowning, leaning against the bureau building's rough walls. _I want to check something._ It worked every time, like they thought he was such a genius he must be onto something. For the first time in his life, Reid would rather not be a genius.

Every word Juliette had said had been like a hammer and nail to the heart. Reid had never considered himself a selfish person, not by a long shot. And he'd never seen Juliette as a hindrance. Had he been wrong? _Had_ he been selfish? Blind? He worked in the BAU, he saw everything. Didn't he?

_Did_ Prentiss love him? That would explain why she hadn't met his eyes since Juliette's accusations, and why she seemed so angry with him, and why, when Hotch had sent them to the van den Burgh's hotel together, she had come back angrier and Juliette had come back looking delighted. _He_ didn't feel delighted. He didn't think he'd ever been more confused.

Prentiss was beautiful; he accepted that, in a distant, disconnected way. He admired and respected her, professionally. He liked her, platonically. But romantically? He'd never even considered the possibility. And he wasn't sure he wanted to, either.

The quiet of the library enveloped him as the door shut behind him. Reid didn't quite know why he'd come to the library, but as soon as he stepped inside, the warmth and comfort he'd know all his life swallowed him and he felt safe. The library was the one place that had always been a good place to him, where he could fill his mind with magical people and places where people had loving fathers and mothers that didn't hallucinate people telling them to kill themselves.

The BAU had been a good place too. Until today. Reid wiped raindrops off his glasses. Today, he couldn't just lose himself in a book. He needed to think, to shut out Juliette and Prentiss for a while and focus completely on the case.

Music filtered cheaply through a speaker near him; a delicate, tinkling melody and a woman's haunting voice.

_Why does my heart go on beating?  
Why do these eyes of mine cry?  
Don't they know?  
It's the end of the world  
It ended when you said goodbye…_

For a moment, Reid wondered why he felt this way. Juliette had said herself, it wasn't like they couldn't be friends. Could never see each other again. So why did he feel so lost now that she was no longer at the BAU? He'd worked a million cases without her. And yet, for one short week, she had allowed him to think that he had helped her find her career. For one short week, he had thought that he had put her where she belonged, that he had done for her what Gideon, so long ago, had done for him.

He shook his head irritatedly. _Forget her._ The answer lay right under his nose. He knew it did; it always did with cases like this. Something about the star? The significance of an eight-pointed star… Juliette had said that they probably learned to draw them from a book.

_Draw Me A Star_. That would be the best place to start. He walked slowly to the children's book section. A tiny dark-skinned girl with hair tightly braided like rope rushed up to him. "Mister, mister, could you read this to me?" She waved a book in his face: _The Nickle-Nackle Tree_. Reid was about to brush her off, but the he stopped; why shouldn't he read it to her? He needed to switch off his mind for a moment so that he could focus it properly.

"Okay," he said, taking it from her and sitting down. "I'm Spencer. What's your name?" She climbed unabashedly onto his knee.

"Anna," she said, curling up in the crook of his arm. He smiled at her, amazed at the warm, fuzzy feeling he was already getting from reading a little girl a book. He opened it to the first page.

"Okay, Anna… _The Nickle-Nackle Tree._"

"Anna, do you think you could find another one?" The little girl climbed off his knee, took the book from him and eyed him suspiciously.

"And you'll read that one to me too?" she asked, her dark eyes mistrustful. He smiled reassuringly.

"Of course. But I came here looking for a book called _Draw Me A Star_. Do you think you could find it for me?"

"_Draw Me A Star?" _The girl repeated, slowly and carefully. He nodded. She flounced off, humming to herself. Spencer sighed. He couldn't shake the feeling that he was wasting precious time, time that was fast running out. He closed his eyes. _Relax, Reid_, he told himself sternly. _You can't think like this._

Anna came skipping back with a dark book clutched in her arms. She presented it to him proudly. He turned it over: _Draw Me A Star_, _Eric Carle_. "Well done, Anna, this is perfect!" The little girl positively glowed. He patted his knee and she settled herself down.

He began to read, slowly, lingering on the pictures, trying to leach every miniscule detail from the pages, every little thing that could be a clue. They reached the rhyme at the end and Reid traced the star with his fingertip. _"Down, over, left and right, draw a star, oh so bright._" He stared at it for a while, then suddenly closed the book.

"I like that one," Anna said happily.

"Me too," Reid replied. "It reminds me of someone I know. Do you want to try and draw some stars?" He pulled his pen and notebook from his satchel. "Here," he said, kneeling by the low table and clearing away some of the books.

She took the pen from him and poised it awkwardly over the paper. He propped up the book. "Shall I do it first?" She nodded and gave him the pen. Soon the paper was covered in eight-pointed stars.

"Anna?" Reid looked up sharply. A motherly-looking dark-skinned woman stood in front of them, arms folded over her chest, full of books. "Time to go, honey. Thank you for looking after my daughter." She flashed startlingly white teeth at him. "Anna, pick two."

Anna grabbed _The Nickle-Nackle Tree_ and her hand wandered towards _Draw Me A Star_. She looked back at Reid uncertainly. He grimaced. "Can I take that one, Anna? I need it for work. FBI." He pulled out his badge.

Anna's mother raised an eyebrow. "FBI? Why do you need that book for the FBI?"

Reid glanced at the little girl. "I can't say. Or shouldn't, in front of Anna… I'm with VICAP – the Violent Criminal Apprehension Program."

"Sounds gruesome."

Anna had taken the badge out of Reid's hand and was studying it carefully. "Cool!" Then her face fell. She stroked the star on the cover of the book longingly. "When will you have it back?" He smiled.

"I'll be done by tomorrow," he told her gently. "I can just photocopy it."

"Can you drop it off to my house?" she gave him an address. He looked up at her mother, who smiled and nodded.

"I suppose you're safe, if you're FBI. We'll be around."

Reid grinned. "I'll try to be, too." He repeated the address Anna had given him. "See you tomorrow, then, Anna." And she bounced off. He marvelled for a minute at the ease with which he had won her heart. If only adults could be won over like that. He could just offer to read an unsub a book and all of the BAU's problems would be solved. All of _his_ problems.

But this was the real world. Reid leant back on the couch and pulled _HeartSick_ out of his satchel. He sat there, with _Draw Me A Star_ on one knee and _HeartSick _on the other.

There was something he was missing. Some link between the two. _HeartSick's_ Beauty Killer had always been one step ahead of the police and the FBI, had left a trail just like Reid's unsub only much longer, before infiltrating the case by posing as a psychiatrist and kidnapping Detective Archie Sheridan, the head of the task force set up against her, before torturing him to within an inch of his life. _Draw Me A Star_ was a child's book with a simple, cyclic storyline that leaves the reader contented. They were completely different. So where was the connection?

The only one he could think of was Juliette. A line from _HeartSick_ drifted into his mind: _Archie often wondered if he would have trusted Gretchen so easily if she hadn't been so beautiful._ But the BAU didn't need psychiatrists; they all had the training to do it themselves.

His mind floated back to Juliette. Juliette crying in his kitchen. _Mom was always around, y'know?_ Juliette, her delicate face pale and nervous as she presented her ideas to Gideon. _The unsub probably had parents with a lot of time to give them._ Juliette tracing the star with her fingers. _I've only ever met one other person who draws stars like that._ Juliette, the feverish light that appeared in her eyes when she mentioned her favourite book. _Gretchen is amazing! She's the kind of serial killer I'd want to be._ Juliette, her top teeth tugging worriedly at her bottom lip. _I never meant for Drew to get hurt._ Juliette, the slight smile Reid had sensed on her face as he told her he didn't want to be without her. Juliette, tears streaming down her face in desperation. _We've been so selfish. You've been blind._ Juliette, her freckly nose crinkled as she laughed at him. _I bet you'd have seen right through Gretchen Lowell._ He'd wondered why she was laughing.

_Archie often wondered if he would have trusted Gretchen so easily if she hadn't been so beautiful._ Reid sat bolt upright, his blood freezing as the final brick fell into place and he realised just how blind he'd really been.

It was Juliette. _Juliette_ was Gretchen Lowell. And _he_ was Archie Sheridan.

* * *

A/N: Yes? Working? Horrified? Not really? Oh, well. You know. School starts again next week, so that may be the last you hear from me for a while. I'm a geek this year, you see. Guess where my inspiration came from: only the biggest and most gorgeous geek of all time. I bought _HeartSick_ and its sequel _SweetHeart _today, found them tossed carelessly into a 2 for $20 bin at PaperPlus. Score. I was so proud.

**-for you!**


	10. Prisoner

**A/N: My boyfriend, reading the last chapter over my shoulder, read the passage with Anna on Spencer's knee and asked "is he a pedophile?" (He's never been a CM fan.) For all you guys out there: that bit wasn't meant to be pedophilic. I apologise. Oh: and climaxes have never been my strong point. I apologise for that too.**

**-for you!

* * *

**

The words on the page in front of me blurred out of sensical order in a haze of tears. _Why do we like to hurt so much?_ I'd always been captivated by the words of the Paramore song because I knew they were true, especially for me. I thought it was just because I was a writer, so drama was what I knew how to do best, that I purposefully, helplessly took courses in life that would hurt me.

This was one too far. I'd known at the end of that first day that if I didn't leave right then, I'd end up hurting myself far more than if I'd just accepted that it wasn't meant to be and let well enough alone. But that just wasn't me, was it? I found an odd kind of selfish satisfaction in wallowing in anguish. It was sickening.

I turned my music up louder, trying to drown out my self-disgust. I realized I was listening to music that no-one listened to anymore: _I've Had You_ by Jenny Morris. But that was me, too; it wasn't cool to me until it had been and gone to everyone else. I'd always thought this was a transfixingly creepy song.

_Let the sun turn into Earth  
And Earth all turn to ice  
The seasons stop right in their tracks  
And day turn into night  
I will be untouchable  
I will feel no pain  
'Cause I've had you  
I've had you... _

I screwed up the sheet of letter paper and threw it against the wall as tears made it illegible. It joined the six or seven others that lay on the floor, as far away from the overflowing wastepaper bin as possible. I usually didn't believe in waste paper, but I didn't want to get this wrong. I was writing my application for a place in the FBI training program, so it was important that I got it exactly right. I'd show Strauss. I'd show them all.

_Way up there is where you take me to  
'Cause I've had you  
I've had you... _

I got angry with the song and turned it off. Then the silence pressed on my ears until I got angry with that, too.

I hated being in this kind of mood, restless, not knowing what to do, where to go, what to listen to. I paced for a minute, then sat down on my bed with my head in my hands and took deep breaths.

Faintly, I heard Charisse's phone ring. While I had mastered the finer arts of my cellphone and assigned different songs to people who called me often, Charisse hadn't bothered and her phone, which she must have left in her office, emanated a generic tinkling melody. It was probably Andrew.

My thoughts returned to that first day at The BAU. When I'd walked in with Morgan pacing and Prentiss and JJ deep in conversation, passing papers between them, and Hotch and Gideon discussing the press, I'd been strongly reminded of the moment in _Kung Fu Panda_ where Poh first walks into the training room to find the Furious Five training hard, with shouts of _hi-ya!_ and odd bursts of flame. I was in the presence of my ultimate heroes, people I absolutely worshipped, conscious of every move I made. Like a dream had suddenly come true, and I was just waiting until the skirt I'd been wearing fell down, or something similar that always happens in dreams where you meet your heroes. Ultimately, I felt like I didn't belong.

And on that first day, I'd been a right Mary-Sue. To Spencer, it was already okay to embarrass myself. When we met at the library, it had been like I'd known him forever and ever, like he was my guardian angel, always there but never seen until now. But it wasn't just to Spencer; I'd been arrogant in the conclusions I'd made to everybody. Showing off as if I, like Prentiss thought, believed I could do their job better than they could. No wonder they'd all hated me.

Twenty minutes later, the phone's melody was starting to really bug me. That was Drew for you; he couldn't just realize that Charisse didn't have her phone on her, he had to keep calling back and calling back. No doubt he thought she was ignoring him and he could wear her down.

It had only been about an hour since I'd walked out of the bureau, but it already felt like an eternity. I felt terrible. Not about leaving in itself; I still thought I'd done the right thing. But about leaving things the way I had. I'd spilled Prentiss' secret affection in a moment of heated temper and it wasn't even her I was angry with, and I hadn't apologized or even acknowledged I'd done it. And I still knew, deep down, that the real reason I'd left was that life at the BAU had become boring.

A further ten minutes of _Oh, When The Saints Came Marching In_ and I lost patience. Even though Charisse's 'office' was the only room in the house besides the cellar that I never went into, I marched upstairs and threw open the door.

And froze, mouth open, foot poised, eyes popping. The phone lay on the desk that faced the clipboard on the wall. That wasn't unusual for Charisse, considering that the phone's charger was still attached. The window was open, and a few invoices for Pilates classes were blowing around on the floor, but that wasn't strange either.

It was the seven photos pinned carefully on the corkboard, holding dominance over the room like a storm cloud, and the eight-pointed star drawn on a piece of computer paper holding them all together.

I knew the faces in those photos far too well: Jacob Montgomery, Rebecca Green, Stephanie Palmer, Frank van den Burgh, Anne Murphy, Charles Hudson and Devon Miller, all lying on their stomachs in the same dark alley, one arm missing and an eight-pointed star carved on each of their right hips.

Only two groups of people would be able to get photos like these, that hadn't been released to the press: the FBI crime-scene investigators that took them, and the killer. I forgot about the phone, still singing on the desk. I forgot about Andrew. I forgot about my application, about Spencer and Prentiss, about everything that a minute ago had been everything to me. All I could hear was a roaring in my ears as if I was falling; all I could see was the photographs; and all I could think about was what they were forcing me to believe. _It's not real, Char._

_It could be._

Suddenly it all fell into place. The way she'd reacted when I told her that Gideon was questioning Andrew. The way she'd kept telling me – _beggin__g_ me to stop going into the FBI every day. The way her face had twitched horribly when I'd told her how upset everyone's relatives had been at their murder, when I'd mentioned Thompson and Mr. Palmer and Yvonne van den Burgh. The way she'd hugged Andrew: _It'd take more than two FBI agents to take you away from me._

_I hope so._

Suddenly it all made sense, in the most horrible way possible. _Charisse?_ A psychopathic torturing murderer? What would I do? She was like my big sister. I couldn't just turn her in and condemn her to rot in a jail cell for the rest of her life. But I couldn't just let it go, pretend I didn't know and keep hearing from Spencer about the number of victims the Beauty Killer was dispatching under my nose. Spencer, too, had become like family.

_Charisse_, the Beauty Killer. My bouncy, spaced-out, yoga-teacher flatmate and best friend. I'd never thought of serial killers as people, always as objects, even though I knew they appeared outwardly normal and led completely ordinary lives.

I heard a slight _thunk_ from behind me and spun around, heart racing. A water bottle lay abandoned on the floor; Charisse had dropped it as she walked into her study and found me standing there. I felt my mouth opening and closing helplessly as I stood there, face to face with the serial killer that had saved my life as she stood there in leggings and a sports-singlet, a sweatband holding back her gorgeous hair, a shocked expression on her face.

"What are you doing, Juju?" she asked, her voice unusually quiet and subdued.

I gaped. "I – your phone was – I just – Char, where did you get these photos?"

She looked at them and then back at me, her pretty face sad. "It's you, isn't it," I said, though not as a question. I knew the answer. She started to cry silently, tears rolling down her cheeks. "Char…"

"I'm sorry, Juju," she said, in a voice throbbing with tears. I shook my head wonderingly, wondering what to say. "I never meant for anyone to get hurt –"

"What do you mean, Char? Seven people are horribly, _purposefully _dead and you say you never meant to _hurt_ anybody?"

"No! I mean – they weren't _people_, not to me, I didn't know them…"

"I don't understand," I said, tears welling up in my own eyes.

She shook her head. "Neither do I."

"What do we do now, Char?" I asked. "I don't want to be the reason you spend the rest of your life in prison – because that's where you're headed, Char," I said desperately. "Prison. For the rest of your life. I don't want to be the one who does that to you – but I don't want to be the reason _they're_ dead!" I indicated the photos. She let out a small sob.

"I'm sorry, Juju," she repeated, as though that should make everything better; as though _I_ was the one being unreasonable.

"I don't know what you think that's going to do," I said bitterly, echoing Mr. Palmer. "Sorry won't bring them back." A chilling thought hit me. "Does Andrew know?"

"God, no! No-one knows."

"_I_ know," I corrected her. "And I have to tell someone." I pulled my phone out of my jacket pocket.

"I can't let you do that, Juju." Her voice was suddenly hard in a way that made my spine tingle. I looked up at her. Suddenly, she pounced.

* * *

She landed on top of me, pinning me to the ground, her legs holding mine down, one hand on my arm, the other around my throat. I tried to move as the hand blocked my airway, but she was subtly strong from years of yoga and Pilates. My free hand clawed at her face, trying to find her eyes as my vision started to go dark, but I couldn't do anything at all and slowly, horribly, my mind went blank and I lost consciousness.

* * *

I woke to the scene of my nightmares for the past week: the sound of sobbing echoed in my ears and shadows danced on the rough walls. I realized I was in the cellar, and panicked for a while. Charisse was hunched in one corner, making the sobbing noises. My hands and feet had been tied, and even though I'd never imagined that Charisse would be able to tie good knots, they held when I tested them. I wasn't gagged, but I knew I didn't need to be. The cellar was completely soundproofed; Char and I had tested it, shutting each other in and screaming as loud as we could. Tentatively, afraid, I looked around me.

Candles littered a table in front of me, so I could see the room well enough with a flickering, eerie yellow light. The table also held a silver instrument that I vaguely recognized as a cautery iron, a bloodstained knife, a hammer and a scalpel.

I shuddered. The rest of the room looked much as it had the last time I'd been in there, which was probably only a month or so after I moved in. Then I looked down at the floor where I sat, and gagged as bile rose in my throat.

On either side of my feet were two straps bolted to the floor. I momentarily, crazily wondered if they had been there before, or if she'd put them in herself. And on the floor was… blood. I was sitting in blood. My beautiful grey marl tunic was covered in wet, sticky blood.

I panicked, writhing around, trying to get away from the still-wet blood that I knew belonged to Devon Miller. Because my feet were bound, I ended up keeling over sideways and hitting my cheekbone on the harsh stone floor; pain shattered through my face and disgust pounded through me as my arms and chin smeared with blood as well.

"Juju…" Charisse had stood up. I righted myself with difficulty and tried to look defiant.

"What are you doing, Charisse?"

She hiccupped with the aftermath of her sobs. "I can't let you tell Spencer," she said quietly. She sat down, cross-legged, placing the table between us. "I didn't want this to happen."

"You thought you could just run a torture-slash-slaughter-house in our cellar without me noticing? Ever?"

She gulped, smothering another hiccup. "I didn't think – I thought it was just going to be once, Juju, honestly, I did. But… it's like smoking. You know you shouldn't, and there are things about it that you hate, like the taste, or the way the kids look at you when you light up, and every time you tell yourself it's the last time, but… in the end, the addiction wins through and you just can't help yourself."

Watching her sitting there, moving her feet into the Lotus position, hiccupping, tears still leaking down her face, I actually felt sorry for her. And deep down, I was frighteningly aware that this was my fault. _I_ made her read _HeartSick_. I was the one obsessed with reading and even _writing_ books about these kinds of people and shoving them under her nose. I had created this monster who talked about torture the way people talk about smoking. She sniffed.

"He'll come looking for you, you know," she said suddenly. "Spencer, I mean. And when he does, I'll be waiting."

My blood ran cold. Literally. People say that in stories; I myself had used it in plenty of them, but I never thought that it would actually feel as though my blood had snap-frozen in my veins, freezing my heart until I was gasping for breath. I couldn't help it; I started to cry.

"Char," I sobbed, trying to wipe my eyes on my knees, "Char, _please_…"

"Don't cry, Juju," she said soothingly, just like she used to when I first moved in and my father would call, or when I'd broken up with Nathan. Of course, this just made me cry harder. "A part of me needs to do this."

I was repulsed. "_Needs_ to kidnap one of your flatmate's best friends and torture him in front of her eyes? Char, that's insane. What's happened to you?"

"I could blindfold you, if you like."

I gazed at her, shocked. "So I have to listen to him screaming instead? Wow, thanks, Charisse."

She actually smiled. "I'm really sorry, Juju," she repeated again. I was disgusted. Suddenly she wasn't the woman I knew, loved, even admired. That woman had gone, disappeared from the face of the earth. The Beauty Killer had murdered her. "But your hero Gretchen Lowell took a detective and tortured him half to death. I'll take my time… ten days must feel like forever from his position. But she was weak… she let him live, and ended up in prison for it. I need to show myself I'm stronger than Gretchen was. And if your Spencer will walk right into my hands… it's too good to refuse."

This was the time, if I'd been writing the story instead of living it, where I would have spat in her face. But I wasn't writing it, so it wasn't the perfect dramatic climax. I wasn't one to spit, and I probably would have missed. "Gretchen wasn't weak," I said softly. "Keeping Archie alive was the cruelest thing she could possibly have done to him. He said if she could have thought of something worse, she would have done it. You're the weak one, Char. You're insane. What's happened to you?"

"You did," she said simply. "You and Gretchen."

I didn't want to acknowledge the comment, so I changed the subject. "How did you do it? How did you know how to cauterize the arteries? Where did you get the morphine from?" Something inside me needed to ask, even though the rest of me didn't want to know. I adopted a slightly accusing tone. "You said Andrew didn't know."

"He doesn't. I got it from Mark."

I blinked. "Who the hell is Mark?"

"A friend of Drew's from med school. I emailed him pretending to be Drew. He was happy to get it for me. I met him in town – I said Drew was working and couldn't get away." She shrugged. "He was gullible."

"And the… cauter-izer?" I asked, knowing my eyes must be wide as saucers.

"The same. I said that the hospital refused to lend him one and he needed it for a patient that had been turned away from the hospital. Of course he bought it – Drew's always been like that." I shook my head, amazed despite myself, not just with the matter-of-fact tone with which she spoke of how she'd used her boyfriend as an accessory to murder, but with the way she'd done it all.

"How long had you been planning to do this?"

She shrugged dispassionately. "I think I was unconsciously planning it when I was reading. I never thought I'd actually do anything. Then I thought, why not? Just once. I thought doing it would be so horrible that I'd never, _ever_ even think about doing it again. But it wasn't, Juju. It was… hypnotizing."

There was a long pause while I tried not to think about this. Then another question rose to my head and I just had to ask it, despite the fact that I was beginning to feel like a true FBI agent; a stranger investigating a victim. "Did you know about Palmer and Montgomery?" She nodded, smiling again as she described the 'glory of her art' to me.

"I thought if I made some kind of connection between them the feds would jump on it." Her smile became gloating, proud. "I always knew I was better than them."

I was torn between disgust that she had put so much into the murders and amazement at how intricately she had laid everything out. Suddenly she stood up.

"I've got to get back to work," she said. "Shall I put this over your mouth, just in case?" She produced a roll of silver Duct Tape, shining in the candlelight.

"That won't be necessary, Charisse," I assured her, trying to sound pacifying. She pulled a strip off the roll with a horrid ripping noise.

"Oh, well, I don't want to take any chances; and besides," she smiled a glorifying smile again, "Gretchen did." She clamped the tape over my mouth and left the cellar. I heard the _click_ of the lock behind her.

* * *

When I was fifteen, we did a unit in Drama on Mask. We took plaster casts of our own faces and decorated them to make them look like some kind of 'god or monster'. It was the first time I ever felt claustrophobic, sitting in an uncomfortable straight-backed chair, trying not to move my face in case I cracked the plaster that covered it. Every time I put the mask on, the cold would envelop my mouth and nose and I would have a moment of panic before I took the first breath and the plaster began to warm against my skin.

That's what the Duct Tape made me feel. That moment of claustrophobic panic before I realized that I could still breathe.

I sat there in the dancing light of the guttering candles for about an hour, feeling scared for Spencer. Then the fear started to wear off. I started to get bored. I used my shoulders to clear a space on the table, nearly lighting myself on fire in the process, twisted round until it was behind me and I could lean my head back on it. Eventually, in this position, I fell asleep.

* * *

_The front door creaked slowly open and I heard Spencer's tentative voice: "Juju?" I tried to reply, but the Duct Tape held firm over my lips and no sound came out; I slowly became aware that he wouldn't hear me anyway. I had no choice but to sit there and hope against hope that he would find me and get help before Charisse got back. _

_A noise behind me made me twist violently around; Charisse was back already. How long had I been asleep? I was usually a light sleeper. How had she managed to get in without waking me up? Then I realized that it didn't matter. What mattered was that Spencer, helpless, vulnerable Spencer, was about to walk right into Charisse's trap._

_Panic rolled over me in nauseating waves as I listened to Spencer's calls getting closer. Why couldn't he just accept that I wasn't home and try somewhere else? Leave a note and call again tomorrow? As the sound of Spencer's footsteps on the stairs to the cellar drifted closer, Charisse tiptoed around until she stood beside the door, a finger teasingly placed in front of her lips._

"_Juju?" The cellar door clicked and slowly inched open, concealing Charisse from the person about to walk through it. Spencer's innocent face peered around it. I gazed at him helplessly, shaking my head, _no, Spencer, please…

_His eyes met mine and widened. "Juju, what happened? What are you doing? Oh, God…" He ignored my frantic head-shaking and muffled 'mmm-mmm's and ran to help me. He knelt at my feet and his soft hands had barely touched the baling twine holding them together when the cellar door slammed shut, the gust of air from the movement dousing the candles and plunging us into darkness._

_The windowless cellar was pitch black. "Juju, what's happening?" Spencer asked, his fingers closing around my leg. It wasn't until sobs began tipping me over that I realized I was crying. _

_A match hissed into life. "Spencer," Charisse lilted, her eyes reflecting the tiny flame as she began to relight the candles. "So glad you could join us." I couldn't help marveling at the way her brown hair shone auburn in the candlelight, mimicking the colour of her boyfriend's that I so admired. _

"_Charisse!" Spencer sounded relieved. "What's going on?" His eyes caught the silvery blade of the knife and widened again._

"_Do you remember the story of Archie Sheridan, Spencer?" se asked silkily, blowing out the match. Spencer blinked. She smiled. "It's your story now." And she jumped on him. He didn't have a chance to defend himself; she wrestled his arms and legs into the straps bolted to the floor and picked up the scalpel. "Now," she purred, "let's see what fun we can have here."_

_And laughed…

* * *

_

I woke up choking, trying to gasp but unable to through the Duct Tape. I was hyperventilating and I couldn't stop, even though I knew that if I threw up against the tape it would either go up my nose and suffocate me or slip down my airway and drown me. I forced myself to take deep, calming breaths.

I was alone in the cellar. The candles still burned. I was still bound and gagged and all I could hear was the sound of my own heavy, panicked breathing.

I rested my head against the table again. Spencer hadn't come. _He'll come looking for you, you know._ She didn't know Spencer. He wouldn't look for me, not yet. He'd sit hunched in a corner at home for at least a day, hoping that I'd repent and come looking for _him_.

But this kind of time frame brought questions to flood my mind. How long could Charisse keep me down here? Did she intend to feed me? What would she tell Andrew when he asked where I was? Probably that I was at Spencer's, I reasoned, and they'd have a nice little laugh about how sweet we looked together. My stomach twisted at the thought of Drew, completely smitten, painfully unaware that the beautiful, amazing woman he was in love with was a psychopathic serial killer.

I'd already accepted the fact that, if Charisse's plan worked, I wouldn't make it out of the cellar alive. I didn't know what she'd planned to do with me after she killed Spencer – I momentarily fought not to throw up again – but she wasn't stupid. She knew she couldn't let me out, knew that the moment I could, I'd tell Hotch what had really happened to his Dr. Spencer Reid.

My only hope was that Charisse's elaborate plan would fall through somehow, which didn't seem likely. I started to cry again.

* * *

What must have been hours later, my tears had run out, my throat was parched and raw, and my hands and feet had passed tingling and were hurting quite badly. I'd given up hoping for a miracle. I now felt almost calm, strange as that sounded to my own ears as I mused over it in my mind.

Then, faintly, unbelievably, I heard a distant _crash_ and a familiar voice shouting out, "_FBI!" _

"Morgan!" I tried to yell automatically, feeling my lips tear against the Duct Tape and blood begin to pool horribly between them. I added my saliva to it, wondering why I hadn't thought of it before, hoping that the liquid would weaken the adhesive and I'd be able to remove the tape.

When it didn't, I grimaced, swallowed the blood and focused on making as much noise as possible without moving my now torn and bloody lips. After about ten minutes when the noises of the search failed to get louder, I began to lose the faint hope I'd gained from the noise. My voice finally gave out and I felt myself tipping again; as my head touched the floor a burst of heat tore apart my head in excruciating agony and for the second time that day, I lost consciousness.

* * *

**A/N: Will they find her? Oh, who knows. Maybe she died when she hit her head on the cautery iron. You'll find out soon enough; I now have a roof over my head and wireless internet! The heavenly choruses are singing… references: _That's What You Get_ (Paramore, _Riot!_) and _I've Had You_ (Jenny Morris, _Honeychild_); of course, _HeartSick_ by Chelsea Cain - I totally recommend it, _I, Philoseraptor_ - you can't find better if you're into that kind of thing. If you like it, try the Sherry Moore novels (starting with _18 Seconds_) by George W. Shuman. Oh, and the rest of the Gretchen series, of course: _SweetHeart_ and _Evil at Heart_. I didn't like _SH_ as much, and I have yet to read _EaH_. Can't find it anywhere. Anywho!**** next chapter: find out where Spencer is in all of this, and what will happen to our poor prisoner! Love you!**

**-for you.**


	11. HeartSick

**A/N: I forgot to mention, significant inspiration for the last chapter came from Aaron "Write about a song" Craig, perhaps the world's least helpful writer. **

**Anywho, for the rest of you, I hope you enjoy this chapter: only 3 more will follow (or, 2,+ epilogue), so make the most of the thrill of new chapters while you can!**

**-for you.**

* * *

"Checkmate."

Spencer Reid put his head in his hands. The police radio next to him crackled. The pieces Gideon had taken from him lay in a pile between his elbows, a ghostly graveyard of soldiers sacrificed in battle or lost in pure stupidity as their general's mind drifted elsewhere.

Reid didn't like to lose. It wasn't something he did often. Playing chess with Gideon was different. There was something about it that kept him coming back, almost childishly, to beg the older man for another game. It was a challenge, yes; that in itself would be enough. Reid loved to challenge himself, and he and Gideon were a reasonably even match at the old board game. But there was something more, something in the way Gideon talked, laughed, smiled when he played. Reid got the feeling that when the black and white board was between them, in Gideon's eyes at least, the two men were equals. Reid would often sit in awe of the way the agent's eyes would burn passionately as he surveyed the way the pieces were laid out, the way he laughed when Reid cursed and smiled when he was losing, as if he were a teacher proud of his student, the way he always looked as though he were enjoying himself, as though he liked the challenge the younger man presented almost as much as Reid himself did.

So he had jumped at Gideon's offer of a game while the others went to search Juliette's house. He knew that the other man wanted to be out there with the rest of them and that it was a sacrifice for him to offer to stay behind and keep his young employee occupied.

Reid would ordinarily want to be out there too, but Hotch had instructed him to remain behind. "You had an emotional attachment to the suspect and are therefore a liability at the scene. I'm sorry, Reid," he had said, and Reid had seen the pity behind Hotch's eyes, "but you'll have to stay here. We'll put you on the radio," he'd added, finding the set in a cupboard and placing it on the table. "As soon as we know the scene is clear or have Clearwater in custody, you can come down."

Reid had nodded weakly, but the truth was that he would have preferred to stay there rather than risk getting into a situation where force against Juliette became necessary. Gideon probably saw that in his face when he'd offered to stay with him. "We could have that game of chess I owe you," the agent had suggested.

And they had, and another. Reid had lost three games of chess in the time it usually took the two of them to play one. He needed to focus, to get his 'head in the game'. That was another thing he loved about playing chess with Gideon: he couldn't do anything else at the same time because the game consumed his whole attention. But today his mind kept drifting away from what Gideon was doing with his king and onto the briefing Hotch was giving over the radio.

"Reid, Gideon, are you still with us?"

Reid pressed the 'talk' button on the set. "Hearing you loud and clear, sir."

Morgan's voice piped up. "What about this?"

"Yep." They tested each of their handsets in turn.

"Right," Hotch finished. "In we go."

Gideon looked at Reid over the table. "Another game?" Reid laughed humorlessly.

"Are you enjoying winning that much?"

Gideon smiled sadly. "I guess chess wasn't such a good idea, then."

"No, it was a brilliant idea. It just… fell through in the execution."

It was Gideon's turn to laugh mirthlessly. "Like so many great ideas." He sighed. "I know how you feel, Spencer," he said. "I felt the same after Sarah…"

Reid smiled. "With respect, sir, Sarah wasn't guilty."

"No," Gideon agreed, his face hard. "Just dead."

Reid's heart sank. "Sir, I'm sorry –"

"It's okay. I know what you mean." Gideon picked up a rook and twirled it absent-mindedly between his fingers. Then the shouts of 'clear' and 'bathroom's clear' coming from the radio stopped.

"Sir, there are trophy photos in an office upstairs," Prentiss said wearily. "Looks like it really was Clearwater."

"House is clear, though," came Morgan's voice. "I'm just about to check the cellar. Could be enough evidence in there to make Strauss happy about an arrest."

"Wait for backup, Morgan," Hotch ordered. "Could be a victim in there. I'm on my way." Reid and Gideon exchanged glances. "All right." There was a slight pause and Reid could hear rustling and the calm _click_ of a gun. "Go."

There was a _crash_. Then silence. "What?" Reid said anxiously.

"Reid, Gideon, get over here and bring medical support," Hotch said quietly. Nausea rolled in Reid's stomach.

"Why? What's down there?"

Morgan cleared his throat. "We've got Clearwater, Reid," he replied. "And… she looks pretty innocent."

Panic flooded Reid's chest, mingling with relief and creating an altogether violently sick feeling. "Is she okay?"

"I've got a pulse," Hotch supplied. Reid felt like he was going to throw up. "She's covered in blood, but I don't think it's hers. Her face looks pretty bad, though… Morgan, can you help with her hands? Reid, just get down here with medics as fast as you can."

* * *

Reid and Gideon didn't exchange a word as Gideon drove them down to Juliette's flat. Explanations were snowballing in Reid's head like a barrel down a hill; Prentiss found trophy pictures in an office upstairs, but Morgan said Juliette was innocent and by the sound of things, unconscious. That only left Charisse.

Which meant that Reid had sat at a table and drank tea with the killer he was chasing, even kissed her on the cheek, and been absolutely none the wiser. He'd thought that Charisse was harmlessly crazy in a cheerful, self-inflicted way, like a teenager. She'd delighted him with the way she seemed so spontaneous and gullible and willing to trust.

But underneath that had lain a killer. Reid was an expert at finding what lay underneath. But he had missed this. Missed the way… he thought back to the times he'd seen her, analyzing every reaction, every expression.

Missed the way she'd flinched and changed the subject every time they'd mentioned the victims' families. He'd dismissed it as her just being sensitive and compassionate… because he'd seen other innocents react that way before. Thinking about it as carefully as he could, he couldn't see the slightest thing that should have given her away to anyone who didn't already suspect her. He shuddered.

The car pulled up next to the others outside the flat. Gideon turned it off and waited for a second. He stole a tentative look at Reid. "Are you ready?" he asked. Reid forced a smile onto his face.

"As I'll ever be," he said, and got out of the car.

JJ met them at the door. "She's conscious," she said, in that warm, kind way JJ had. "She seems to be okay. Shaken, but okay – we'll let the medics confirm that." She looked pointedly behind them.

"They're coming," Gideon assured her. "What's the situation?"

"Juliette's still in the cellar," JJ told Reid. "It's just through there." She pointed. Reid followed her hand, listening to what she was telling Gideon behind him. "… says it was her flatmate. Prentiss is sealing away the photos as evidence. Morgan's taking photos of the cellar and bagging the torture instruments. They're all in there, sir; even a bottle of sulfuric acid in one corner."

Sirens sounded outside as the medics arrived. Reid hurried down the steps, pulling a flashlight from his pocket.

Juliette sat against a table full of candles, her delicate face smeared with blood, a purple bruise blooming on one cheekbone, a new, harsh burn looming on the side of her forehead, pale and shaking, her lips bleeding profusely. Hotch was crouched next to her, asking questions, while Morgan shuffled around the table. Juliette's hands and bare feet were purple, with deep marks from some kind of twine around her wrists and ankles. He rushed forwards and dropped to his knees beside her. "Juju!"

"Spencer," she said weakly, trying to smile and wincing. "You're okay."

"Of course I'm okay! Are _you_ okay? Did she hurt you?" Juliette shook her head.

"She wouldn't hurt me. She was after you – she thought you'd come looking for me. You were going to be her Archie…" she tried to say more, but her hoarse voice faded. Tears leaked down her face. He shushed her. She grabbed him and pulled him into a clumsy hug.

Reid was ashamed at the tears he could feel welling up behind his eyes, especially since Hotch was still crouched beside them. He was ashamed that he'd been so quick to name Juliette, who was quickly becoming his best friend, as a psychopathic serial killer. But he'd been so _certain_ it was her. "I thought it was you," he admitted softly. She let him go.

"You _what_? You thought _I_ was the killer? Spencer! I thought we were friends!" He caught the laugh in her weak, croaky voice.

"It fit. I was wrong."

"I suppose it did fit," she mused wonderingly. "Mom… the stars… Gretchen… I even infiltrated the case pretty well, didn't I?" She tried to smile again. "I guess I'm lucky you did, too," she added. "Or you'd never have found me."

"Miss Clearwater?" Reid turned around; a tall, good-looking young medic stood behind them.

"Yeah."

"I'm Dr. Pantsters." He knelt down and opened his bag. Juliette snorted.

"Pantsters? Nice." He smiled kindly.

"If you have enough of a sense of humor for that, I take it you don't need the ambulance," he said. "That blood isn't yours, is it?"

"No," she replied, tears welling up in her eyes again, "it's Devon Miller's. I'm not hurt." She flinched as he touched an antiseptic cloth to the burn on her forehead.

"Except for the cheek, the burn and the lips," he teased gently. "I can give you a cream for the last two. I think you might have fractured the length of your cheekbone. Did the person who tied you up force you to swallow anything?"

Juliette shook her head. "She didn't do anything except tie me up and stick the tape over my mouth. I did the rest."

"Sounds like you were lucky, then." Dr. Pantsters flashed her a smile. "Just try not to smile too hard and the cheek should set itself right." He smoothed a strip of sticking-plaster to her forehead, covering the burn. "I'll be back with the cream after my shift is finished."

Reid scowled, noticing the obvious come-on the doctor had just executed. "My friend Andrew is a GP down the road," Juliette told him, returning the smile. "He'll probably be dropping round. You could pass it on to him."

"Drew Hurnen? I know him. We went to med school together." Reid watched as Juliette went pale.

"Your first name isn't Mark, is it?" she asked worriedly. Dr. Pantsters shook his head.

"Carl," he amended, extending a hand. She took it.

"Juliette."He flipped her hand over and started rubbing it between both of his.

"You've lost circulation to your hands and feet. Rubbing them together will help."

She raised an eyebrow. "Rub my feet together?"

He chuckled. "Walking around will help the feet. Get out of the cellar. It was a pleasure to meet you, Juliette. I'll send Dr. Hurnen around as soon as I can."

She managed a small smile. "You too, Dr. Pantsters, or can I call you Pants?"

He chuckled again. "Carl," he said firmly. "I hope I'll see you again sometime." He flashed his perfect white teeth at her.

"Yeah," she replied easily. "Maybe I'll skip being bound, gagged and locked in a cellar for a few hours first next time. See you, Pants."

Reid watched the beaming medic leave, trying not to scowl. He shook his head at Juliette in wonderment. "What?" she said innocently.

"You just spent at least four hours tied up in your own cellar by your best friend, and you're already flirting with the medic? You're unbelievable!" She just grinned at him as best she could before turning to Hotch.

"Hotch, Charisse said she got the morphine and the cautery thing from a guy called Mark who went to med school with Andrew." Hotch looked at Morgan, who put down the Ziploc bags and picked up a phone. "He thought the emails were from Drew. He thought he was helping a doctor do good, not a serial killer. If you tell the hospital, they'll fire him, but it wasn't his fault…"

He laid a hand on her arm. "It's okay, Clearwater. He may need to testify to prove her guilty." He stood up. "We should get back upstairs. Reid…" He trailed off, frowning at Juliette, probably wondering how they were going to get her up the stairs and out of the cellar.

"I can walk, sir," she dismissed. "Just give me a hand up." Hotch held out a hand obediently and Reid, grinning, held out his, too. She took them and hauled herself to her feet. "Ouch."

"Are you okay?" She took a step forwards and stumbled, shocking Reid into lunging forward to catch her. "Here," he said gently, "let me help." She put an arm around his shoulder and he helped her up the stairs. As he glanced back, he saw Hotch watching them with a bemused expression on his face.

* * *

Ten minutes later, the team reconvened in Juliette's living room while she sat on the sofa and watched them. JJ sat down next to her and within moments the two of them were giggling profusely at something. A Siamese-looking cat found its way into the room, wound its body around Reid's legs and jumped on JJ's lap. She stroked it absently.

Hotch cleared his throat. "We need to find Charisse," he said matter-of-factly. "Any ideas where she might be, Clearwater?"

Reid looked at Juliette. "She was teaching Pilates at Lightfoot Dance Studio," the teenager volunteered. "The class should have finished…" she craned her neck to look at the clock on the wall, "…ten minutes ago, so she'll be packing up to head back here. If she gets here and sees all the cars, she'll go somewhere else."

Hotch nodded. "Morgan, call Garcia and have her put tabs on her phone and credit cards. It's Charisse…" he trailed off, looking at Juliette expectantly.

"Boydell," she finished. "Charisse Boydell."

"Right. Do you know where she'll go if she sees our cars out front?"

"Probably Drew's place. Her boyfriend. Maybe back to the studio. I don't know."

"That's Andrew Hurnen, right?" Hotch asked. She nodded. "Okay. I want two agents at each location."

"I'll stay here," Juliette said firmly. Reid cleared his throat.

"Me too," he said. Hotch's eyes narrowed critically.

"All right," he said finally, "but JJ stays too. Prentiss, go with Gideon to the studio. Morgan, you're with me to Dr. Hurnen's place."

* * *

Within moments, Reid found himself alone with JJ and Juliette, still sitting on the sofa and fussing over the cat. "What's her name?" the agent asked. The cat gazed adoringly up at her with vivid blue eyes.

"Flipje," Juliette replied.

Reid sat down on a chair across from them. "Flipje? Is that Dutch?"

Juliette laughed. "Yep. Flipje is a Dutch cartoon character. He looks like a giant raspberry with a head and legs." The cat stretched languidly and jumped off JJ's lap. It padded over to Reid and began vigorously rubbing white fluff onto his black trousers. She sighed. "I still can't believe it was Char all this time," she commented heavily.

"Neither can I," Reid admitted. "I liked her. She was so… spontaneous." He remembered something and pulled her manuscript out of his satchel, which, surprisingly, he was still carrying. He'd thought he'd put it down. "This was really good, by the way," he said, giving it back to her. The cat jumped onto the arm of his chair as he sat back down. He opened his mouth, unsure how to phrase the awkward question in the back of his throat. "Wilson's disease is genetic, right?" he said finally.

She sighed. "Yeah." He waited for her to elaborate, unsure whether she grasped the unasked question. She smiled hollowly. "They tested me when Mom died. I'm negative, but my kids could still have it." Reid tried not to look too relieved.

"Your description of a schizophrenic's mind was very… convincing."

She gave him the empty smile again. "I had a good study subject. I've always loved _pretending_ I was schizophrenic, though." He frowned. Pretending? Why would anyone want to _pretend_ that was happening to them? She watched his frown, laughing. "People out there have a very limited understanding of schizophrenia. Charisse and I would find a public place, like a bus or a café, and I'd berate people for pushing in front of an imaginary friend in a cue, or get upset because I pretended to see someone being beaten up. Char would pretend to be my nurse."She sighed reminiscently. "It's hard to believe I'll never do that with her again."

He laughed. "That does sound like fun," he agreed. Then he changed the subject. "Can I use your bathroom?"

"No," she replied instantly. He smiled. "It's just down the hall."

He'd been in the large bathroom for about a minute when something wet touched his ankle. He jumped and looked down; Juliette's cat, Flipje, was still rubbing against his leg. "Juju? Your cat followed me."

A laugh. "She likes you."

Reid grimaced. "You know she dribbles, right?"

"Only when she's happy," the reply came. "Do you want a cup of tea?" He shouted back his assent.

The cat followed him back into the living room. "You have a weird cat," he commented. Flipje gave him a wounded look before jumping back on JJ's lap. Reid quashed the urge to poke his tongue out at the cat as he sat back down.

"Thanks," Juliette said lightly, poking her head out of the kitchen. "Maybe that's why she likes you. Birds of a feather, and all that." Reid didn't reply.

"So," said JJ after a comfortable silence, "Prentiss in love with Reid? I didn't spot that one." Reid fidgeted in his armchair.

"Well, I made an educated guess and she reluctantly confirmed it," Juliette replied, shrugging. The two girls turned to him. "So, what are you going to do?"

Panic rose in Reid's chest. "Can't _you_ talk to her? Just… tell her to stop loving me!"

Juliette snorted. "It doesn't work like that, Spencer! You can't just stop. Didn't you ever have a crush on anyone in high school?"

Reid felt his cheeks colouring. He had, for ages. She had been older than him, blonde, big-chested, the exact ilk of Shelley Montgomery, who now made him feel uncomfortable. He wondered, for the first time since high school, where Keri was now. Probably dead in a ditch somewhere after overdosing on cocaine or heroin. He pushed her out of his mind. "But love is just like any other emotion," he protested. "If you're angry, you can just take a few deep breaths and you stop. Same with fear –"

"Which rather proves _my_ point, doesn't it? If you're in _love_ with somebody, a few deep breaths can't stop it."

"Well, what do you want me to do about it, then?" he asked, panicking.

"She's not in love with _us_, Reid," JJ said reasonably. "Just… talk to her. Tell her you don't feel the same. She'll understand."

Reid was about to reply, to say he couldn't, there must be another way, when the doorbell rang. "I'll get it," said Juliette, rushing out of the room. Reid heard the door open, and a voice he recognized issued into the living room.

"Hey, Juju! Have you seen Char today? I tried to call her in my lunch break, but she wasn't answering her phone. I was even late back to work – Mrs. Rudin was furious. She only comes to me because I'm never late. She says she went to this _horrible_ doctor who charged her a heap of money for the three hours he made her wait… I don't understand how a doctor can keep somebody waiting for _three hours._ It just seems preposterous. Anyway. I have your cream from Carl – I think he likes you, I've never seen him that nervous before - what did you do to your face, that looks painful! Is Char home? She finished about an hour ago, right?"

Reid's gut wrenched as he waited for Juliette to respond. "Andrew…come inside and sit down."

Juliette's kettle boiled. She had one of those gas kettles that whistled when it boiled and the sound rang in the heavy air, like the screams of someone being tortured.

* * *

A/N: Shoutout to Ivan, for keeping Mabel Rudin waiting for three hours and charging her forty dollars for an x-ray

_**and**_** seventy-five dollars to tell her that her toe was broken. "You can kiss my ass."**

**Next chapter shouldn't be long, as **_**chocolate fish's**_** dad is my new idol. However, I've just written a one-shot (a songfic – I know, shock horror!) so I'll type that first, but I think it's relatively short. Tune in later for the penultimate installment of **_**Draw Me A Star! **_**How will poor darling Drew deal with the news that his beloved is a serial killer?**

**-for you!**


	12. HeartBreaker

**A/N: A short chapter, but who's complaining… the second to last instalment of **_**Draw Me A Star**_**! It's here! It requires no further prelude, I don't think, so all I'm going to say is please review, and enjoy!**

**-for you!**

* * *

"Sit down, Andrew," I repeated, leading him into the living room as JJ switched off the gas under the screaming kettle.

He saw Spencer. "Hey, Spencer, right? Good to see you again." JJ came out of the kitchen. "Oh! Hi. I'm Drew Hurnen."

"Jennifer Jareau, FBI. JJ."

"Oh, you're in the FBI too? Char isn't here, is she?" I took hold of his shoulders and forcibly pushed him into the chair Spencer had just vacated.

"Andrew, you know the serial killer we've been chasing?" The colour drained noticeably from Drew's flushed face.

"Oh, my God… oh my God, I don't believe this! This can't be happening to me! She got taken by a serial killer?" I started to cry. I didn't want to be the one to tell him. The one to ruin his life.

JJ knelt beside him and put a hand on his knee. "Andrew, she didn't get taken. She _is_ the killer."

Andrew actually laughed. "Right. You guys had me worried." He looked from my tears, to Spencer trying to look sympathetic, to JJ, her face serious, her hand still resting on his knee.

For a moment, I thought he was going to faint. Then I was sure he would throw up all over my pale carpet. Then his pale head fell into his trembling hands. He was shaking harder than me after two cups of coffee. I remembered how my heart had stopped when I saw the trophy pictures on the wall. I felt horrible watching him in his horror, like watching something dying; like standing to gaze, entranced, at the effects of spraying insecticide into a spiderweb. I remembered how every book I'd ever read had said that when someone you loved died, it felt like a part of you was dying too. I'd never believed that, but Andrew certainly looked as though his flesh was about to melt into a puddle on the floor.

I did what I do when I don't know any other course of action. I went to make a cup of tea. Most people that I know who do that – Charisse, my boss, Henry, my ex, Nathan – they all said that their mother did it. Mine never did.

I leant over the stovetop, taking deep breaths. I tried to hold them back, but memories of Charisse filled my mind; Char in the middle of a crowded shopping mall, trying patiently to explain to an angry businessman that he had stepped on my imaginary friend's toe. Char making cup after cup of tea when Nathan dumped me. The first time I met her, when she jumped on me and hugged me so tightly I couldn't breathe and told me I was perfect.

My tears hissed as they hit the still-hot gas element. Charisse, my big sister, mother, best friend. It wasn't like she was dead. It was worse. I could hear sobbing, but I wasn't sure whether it was me or Andrew. I had that disconnected feeling, like I was outside myself, watching some little girl crying onto a gas stovetop.

"Juju…" I whirled around, hating being caught so vulnerable and pathetic. I was suddenly struck by the knowledge that my father would have hit me, or at least hit the bench next to me, just to show me how much he would like to hit me. But it was Spencer who stood behind me, hands in his pockets, looking awkward. He stepped forward and I suddenly realised that without my favourite heels that I'd been wearing all week, I would fit neatly under his chin. "I'm sorry," he said softly.

I rushed forward and threw myself into his arms, sobs violently breaking forth again. I couldn't realise at the time that even though I had known Spencer Reid for barely a week, this was the second time he'd held me as I cried. The knowledge, had it struck me at the time, would only have made me feel guilty. He just stood there, saying nothing, as I cried myself hoarse into his baby-blue shirt.

After a while, my sobs subsided into pathetic, hiccupping sniffs. Out of the corner of my eye, I saw JJ enter the kitchen, catch a glimpse of me still clutching Spencer's skinny frame close to me, and left again. I gave a final sniff, and let go. I turned the hob under the kettle back on. Spencer opened and closed his mouth a few times, but no words came out. Expressing his sympathy _really _wasn't his strong point.

"I know," I rescued, "It's okay."

"I'm not so good at comforting people," he said apologetically. I shrugged. It was true; at least he acknowledged it. "I don't know how JJ does it."

"Me neither," I admitted, switching the gas off as the kettle began to moan gently. "We should probably rescue her."

A minute later, tea in hand, I returned to the living room to see JJ sitting next to a white-faced Andrew, talking quietly. She accepted her teacup with a soft "thank-you" and stopped her conversation as we sat down. Drew took a hasty gulp from his own cup, then cleared his throat. "So… what happens now?"

Spencer sat down. "We've got agents stationed everywhere we think she might go," he said factually. "As soon as she turns up, they'll take her into custody and get a confession out of her."

Andrew breathed out slowly. "She won't confess," he said deflatedly. "Even if she's guilty, she won't admit it."

"We have solid evidence. If it should come to a trial, she'll have no chance. She knows we know she did it," Spencer said, then frowned at the complexity of the statement. "She'd be stupid not to confess."

"Or stubborn," Andrew persisted. "You saw how stubborn she was with Juju and that thing with the publisher." JJ looked puzzled at this last reference, but to my relief, she didn't ask for an explanation.

"She's stubborn, Drew, not suicidal," I said sadly. She'll confess, and they'll give her a sentence. And then we'll… move on." I tried to sound convincing, but I wasn't sure it worked. Every person I'd ever loved turned out worse and worse; Mom died, then Nathan horribly betrayed me by telling me he was involved with the head of the cheerleading squad because Tina "didn't have a crazy mother's genetically-diseased ghost hanging over her." _And she's a blonde with big tits and no brain, _I'd added, but only to myself. And now Charisse, who had single-handedly pulled me out of both the former train-wrecks, had turned out to be a psychopathic murderer. Things just kept getting worse. I almost wondered what Spencer would do to me. He put an arm around my shoulders and I repeated what I'd been thinking.

He laughed half-heartedly. "Don't worry," he said, squeezing my shoulder slightly. "I'd never hurt you on purpose, I promise. And anyway, I think Charisse set the bar pretty high." It was my turn for a hollow laugh.

JJ offered to make another cup of tea, so when she got up, I took her place beside Andrew on the sofa and leant into him. He put an arm around me and a smile teased my lips; when I first met him, I would've given anything to be where I was now. After a few minutes, he sighed deeply. "Is it wrong?" he said quietly. I twisted round to look at him. "Loving her? Even now?"

I shook my head, but I didn't really believe it. I knew that if it was me in his situation, I'd still love her too. It was just to hard to believe that Charisse, sweet, kind, bubbly Charisse, could be anything other than what she'd been to me my whole life. I wanted to say something like, _we can't choose who we fall in love with_, but I knew that wouldn't help; even if we could, he still would have chosen her. A more appropriate statement would have been, _we can't know everything about the people we fall in love with,_ but that didn't sound as poetic, so I left it an said nothing.

I felt helpless, unable to say anything or do anything to make him feel better, knowing that everybody else in the room felt the same about both of us. I realised that in the past week and a half, so many moments like this had been ended by a telephone call or the doorbell ringing. I found myself hoping that this would happen again, willing somebody's phone to ring or the doorbell to go. I wouldn't even have minded if a UFO crashed into the ceiling. It would have given us something to do, besides wait.

But usually, the moment you want something the most is the moment you're least likely to get it, so it wasn't until an hour later that Spencer's phone broke the frigid silence.

"Sir?" his face relaxed visibly; I sat up. "That's – yes, sir. We'll be right there." He lowered the phone. JJ put down the manuscript she'd picked up from the coffee table and looked at him. "They found her."

* * *

The flat was closer to the bureau than Andrew's house, so we met Hotch and Morgan in a glass-lined corridor. They led Charisse between them, her hands cuffed behind her back, her pretty head held high. Seeing her like that, handcuffed, defeated, drove home yet again that this was real; it was actually happening.

My flatmate was a serial killer.

I glanced back at Drew, who had come with us despite JJ's protests. His face, which had gradually regained some colour throughout the wait, had lost it again. I laid a hand on his arm in what I hoped was a comforting manner. It probably shattered his final hope: that it was all a big mistake, a joke, a dream; that all it would take would be a pinch, a smile, a laugh, and it would be all over.

By the door to the room that we seemed to be heading for, which looked exactly like the interrogation rooms Id seen on TV programs like SVU, we met with the thin-lipped, stern-looking woman I'd seen that morning (though it seemed like light-years ago) a forboding expression on her lined face: Strauss, the section chief. My heart, already residing at the bottom of my stomach, plummeted.

"Agent Hotchner," she addressed as we came to a stop in front of her. "What do you think you're doing?"

Hotch's face barely changed, his serious frown intact, but I could sense that he would dearly like to roll his eyes. "Mam, we've just caught our killer and are trying to get to a place where we can get an official confession out of her."

Strauss pursed her lips, unconvinced. "How do you know this woman is your killer? She doesn't look like a psychopath to me."

Hotch sighed. "With respect, mam, we know what we're doing."

"You have already arrested two innocent women in this investigation," Strauss said coldly. "I am beginning to doubt that you do."

"This time we have evidence, mam," JJ put in gently. "The torture instruments were found at the suspect's house. Juliette here," she smiled at me, "was bound, gagged and locked in the cellar for four hours this afternoon by Ms. Boydell."

Strauss' eyes narrowed as she looked at me. "How do you know she was guilty of _all_ the crimes in this investigation?" she asked doubtfully. I struggled not to get angry (that definitely wouldn't go down well) but this was such a stupid waste of time!

"She told me, mam," I said firmly.

"Agent Hotchner, I _will not_ see you arrest another innocent woman," she said, ignoring me completely.

"Madam Strauss, I _will not_ see you let a psychopath walk out of this building uncharged," Hotch countered, matching Strauss' tone exactly. "We have eyewitness accounts and substantial evidence against this woman. Excuse us, please."

Strauss didn't move, though Hotch's tone would have made me jump aside instantly. "I want to hear a full confession out of this woman's lips before six o'clock this evening, or she goes home," she said finally.

Hotch sighed. "Fine," he agreed. Strauss stepped aside. I glanced at Spencer's watch: five thirty. It wasn't going to be a problem.

She looked so sad, so helpless in the interrogation room by herself, the handcuffs off now, her arms resting lightly on the table. I saw her glance at Andrew, and her huge brown eyes filled with tears.

"Clearwater?" I jumped at the sound of my name and looked around at Gideon, who had spoken it. "Why don't you do it? She's already confessed to you once before." I gulped. It seemed so…final, to be the one who forced her to speak the words that would land her in a jail cell for the rest of her life. But someone had to do it, and I recognised the opportunity Gideon was giving me to show Strauss I wasn't useless.

If, indeed, I wasn't. "Yes, sir."

The heavy metal door swung shut behind me with a firm _thud_. I noticed dryly that while the rest of the bureau building was stylish and modern, the interrogation room looked old and in desperate need of refurbishment. _Maybe it's to scare people into confessing. _Charisse lifted her still-swimming eyes to me as I sat down opposite her, leaving the silence to hang heavily in the room.

"How could you do this to me, Juju?" she said quietly, her voice cracking. I met her eyes.

"Char, you tied me up, stuck Duct Tape over my mouth, locked me in the cellar and told me you were going to torture and kill Dr. Reid, out there. What did you want me to do?"

She leaned back easily in her chair, a strange gleam in her eyes, an odd smile flirting with the corners of her mouth.

"I don't know what you're talking about," she said calmly.

* * *

**A/N: So Strauss is being stupidly unreasonable. That's how her vendetta against Hotch has always seemed to me, so I can actually see this happening, even if you can't. My finger is bleeding, so I'd better cut this short ****and go find a Band-Aid. Did you know it's clinically proven that ripping a Band-Aid off slowly hurts more than ripping it off fast? Amazing, eh? Anywho. Next chapter: the final showdown! I'll probably put up the next (last) chapter and the epilogue at the same time, so the next update will be my last for this story! Then I'll be so lost… I mentioned to **Sue1313 **that I'm considering writing a sequel, and I am, but I think it'll be a while. Please review, I really do appreciate them and I'm quite willing to hold the last chapter hostage unless I get some. So there.**

**-for you!**


	13. Confessions Of a Pschyopath

**A/N: Here it is, the final installment! Enjoy!**

**-for you!

* * *

**

Deep, unsettling quiet held a brief reign in the small, dilapidated room, but the noise in Spencer Reid's head rang loud. _I don't know what you're talking about._ He was bewildered, more than anything, that Charisse could be stupid enough to take that course. She _knew_ that they knew she'd done it. They had enough evidence to take her to court on, but that would be painfully humiliating, and just a longer road to the same eventual end. Anyone else in her position would just give the FBI what they wanted and save the obvious deception from being added to her record. But Strauss had said she wanted to _hear_ the words spoken from Charisse's mouth. A flicker of unease sparked sickeningly in Reid's chest.

Morgan shifted his weight impatiently. "What's she doing? She knows she's got no chance. Why doesn't she just confess?"

Reid heard Andrew Hurnen sigh. "Maybe this was all just a mistake?" he said half-halfheartedly, but still hopefully. Reid shook his head.

"Look at her," he said, raising his voice slightly so Strauss could hear, "she's way too calm for someone who has no idea why they've been arrested." Strauss met his eyes levelly.

"I want to hear the words _I did it_ come from that woman's mouth," she told him, something in her eyes suggesting a challenge. He didn't know exactly why she was challenging _him_, not when Juliette was the one in the tiny room with Charisse. So Reid shrugged and turned back to the wall-length window.

Juliette had her head rested on her arms. "Char, don't do this," she said quietly, her voice distorting through the speakers. "We _know_ you're guilty, Char. There's no use pretending."

Charisse's slight smile broadened minutely. "You know me and acting, Juju. I'm hopeless. I honestly don't understand why I'm here."

Reid thought they looked like two actors running through a script, one getting into the part properly, the other saying the lines but not bothering to act the rest of the part. It was thoroughly unconvincing, he thought, but Strauss seemed to disagree. "Agent Hotchner, if you are so convinced that this woman is guilty, you should at least have someone in there who knows what they're doing."

"Mam, Clearwater was Boydell's flatmate. The emotional connection is more likely to make the suspect open up than an unfamiliar agent. Please, give her a chance." Strauss shut up just in time for Reid to hear what Charisse was saying.

"Juju, I think you should be seeing somebody," she said in what seemed to be mock-concern. "You've been having nightmares for weeks, but actually _thinking_ that I did that to you? _Me?_ It just doesn't make sense, honey." A flicker of the smile that had been hiding on Charisse's face in such a way that it would have been undetectable to anyone who wasn't trained to recognise it showed momentarily before she quashed it. Juliette looked up, and Reid sensed a dramatic change in her expression.

"Charisse, if you're going to play this game, at least play it properly," she said, a smile twitching her own face. "Forget acting, you know you're hopeless at mind games. If you want to play, play ahead. But you know, Char," she lowered her voice to a dangerous whisper, "I never lose."

The challenge hung between the two girls and Reid found himself marveling at Juliette's strength. Only an hour ago, she had been crying helplessly at the loss of her best friend. Now she was acting as though the woman sitting opposite her was an old arch-enemy.

And Charisse – Charisse smiled, accepting the challenge. She was a completely different person from the woman who had grabbed his hand and acted like an old friend. She now looked ominously sure of herself in a way that made Reid's spine tingle. "You can't tell me you think this is a _game_, Juliette," she said playfully.

"Oh, no, Car. I think it's _you_ who doesn't understand how serious this is. I've been out there and talked to sisters, husbands, girlfriends, people you didn't even _touch_, and they –"

"I didn't touch _anybody_," Charisse said dangerously, as slow and clear as if she were talking to a child.

Juliette blinked, then continued as though the other woman had said nothing. "And their lives have been ruined, Char. Yvonne van den Burgh nearly destroyed her hotel room in her grief. She said it was like something was eating her up from the inside." For the first time, Reid saw Charisse's calm look falter. "_You_ did that to her, Char, and I bet you didn't even think about it. Angelique Thompson reported her boyfriend Jacob Montgomery missing two weeks ago. The next morning they found him, this sweet, loving man, horribly, _horribly_ dead. The day after that she found a ring in his sock drawer. She would have married him and spent the rest of her life happy. Now she'll probably never be happy again." Juliette sat back to admire her handiwork.

Reid was admiring it too; the pretense of surety was completely gone from Charisse's face and tears were welling up in her huge brown eyes. "I didn't," she whispered in a tortured kind of voice. "I didn't."

"You did it to Andrew, too," Juliette said quietly, not meeting the older girl's eyes. "He loved you. Now you're lost to him." Charisse's face crumpled.

"No," she mumbled desperately, "no – I didn't…"

"Did you think about them when you kissed him, Char?" she asked, now sounding defeated, as though she had given up the game and was now asking simply to pass the time. "When you were wrapped in Andrew's arms, were you thinking about what you were going to do to the poor, helpless person you had strapped to the cellar floor? That's worse than cheating, Charisse. You read the book." She leaned forwards, rising from hr chair until her face was close to the other woman's, her voice now deadly soft. "You know what's more intimate than sex?"

_Violence_, Reid thought instantly, Gretchen Lowell's voice ringing in his ears. He shuddered involuntarily. Juliette was almost overdoing it now, but it was working; the power balance in the room had completely shifted and the yoga teacher was cowering in her chair, sobbing. Reid cast a sideways glance at Strauss. She had averted her eyes from the scene, but as he watched her, she glanced at the clock on the wall and frowned. He followed her eyes and gulped; ten minutes to six, and Charisse Boydell now looked too distraught to confess anything.

Juliette cast a hesitant glance back at the window separating her from Reid and the others, and the spark of pity that already burned in her dark eyes intensified as she saw Andrew, who'd been giving dry sobs since she mentioned his name. She looked at Reid, and he placed his palms, fingers spread, on the window, hoping she'd get the message. _Ten minutes_. She dipped her head in assent, then turned back to Charisse.

Another minute passed in painful silence. Juliette put her head in her hands and eventually, Charisse swallowed her tears and tried to regain her lost composure.

"What did it feel like, Char?" Juliette said helplessly. "As you sat there and watched them drown in their own blood? Did it feel good?"

"No," Charisse moaned, "no…"

"You told me it was hypnotizing. Addicting. Like smoking."

"Every smoker… wants to quit," Charisse choked out.

"Most smokers are only killing themselves," Juliette said, a tremor finally evident in her voice. "Your _addiction_ has killed seven innocent people you never even knew. Good people – athletes, poets – Anne Murphy was only sixteen years old! And you killed them, carefully, deliberately –"

"No!" Charisse shouted desperately. "Not purposefully, I hardly knew what I was doing! It just… happened! Reid heard Strauss' clothing move behind him and felt as though a weight had been lifted from his shoulders.

Juliette slumped back into her chair. "But you did it," she said tiredly, sounding like the fight had gone out of her. "You tortured and killed seven innocent people."

"Charisse glanced furtively at Reid and the others through the window, but it was obvious that she could see the game was up. She sighed. "Yes," she said sadly. "I did it."

Morgan and Prentiss burst into the room, shattering the subdued atmosphere that the two women had sunk into. Morgan took Charisse's hands and clamped them back into the handcuffs. "How could you do this to me?" the woman said, still in the same sad, quiet voice. "Your best friend?"

"You should have confessed, Char," Juliette replied, just as sadly. "And… you're not my friend. The Charisse Boydell who was my best friend wasn't a psychopathic serial killer… and she would never have lied to the FBI."

But as Morgan and Prentiss led her away, Reid saw a tear slide down Juliette's flushed cheek.

* * *

Strauss looked suitably cowed when they all gathered in the BAU offices later, but nothing that could have passed as an apology had escaped her thin lips. Reid hadn't expected it to. They sat around the sandalwood table in the briefing room, Hotch standing at its head leaning forwards on his splayed hands that pressed on the table. Juliette had hardly said anything either, despite Gideon's clumsy compliments: "Nicely done," he had said gruffly as they'd made their way back. She'd sniffed.

"It was a horrible thing to do," she'd dismissed, her arms around Andrew, trying to comfort the doctor. "I completely betrayed her… and I almost enjoyed it, in a dark, twisted kind of way."

"Somebody had to do it," he'd replied consolingly.

"But that somebody didn't have to be me," she'd protested."It could have been somebody she didn't know, didn't trust." Gideon had sighed, knowing it would be useless to argue, even though Reid knew that Juliette had only prised the confession out of her because she knew her weakness.

"Well, in any case, you handled it well," he'd said finally. "You showed great strength of character and some skill at interrogation. Well done."

Juliette had brightened after this, but definitely wasn't her usual bubbly self. As Reid cleared his throat to say something to her, Strauss spoke instead, addressing Hotch as usual.

"Agent Hotchner, this investigation was conducted in entirely the wrong manner," she said sternly. Hotch sighed and sat down. "I am prepared to overlook this, however, on the condition that _this girl_," she glared at Juliette, "never sets foot in the bureau again."

Juliette made a noise of outrage. "But, mam, that's not fair," she said hotly, half rising from her seat. "I was just about to submit an application to begin training!" Shock became evident on Strauss' face. It was obvious that the idea hadn't crossed her mind.

"Training?' she repeated disbelievingly. Juliette nodded. "Well… you haven't actually submitted it yet, have you?" _Oh my God,_ Reid thought, outrage flaring in his own veins, _she's going to stop her from ever becoming an agent…_

"Madam Strauss, that's not fair," JJ echoed politely. "Juliette hasn't done anything wrong. Dr. Reid invited her here, she didn't just barge in. It wasn't _her_ fault Thompson and Kessler were arrested. You can't take away her career just because her flatmate turned out to be a serial killer." Juliette smiled gratefully at the agent. Reid thought Strauss was about to explode.

"I'm not saying I've been accepted, mam," Juliette said. "I just don't think it's fair if you don't let me try."

Strauss said nothing, and for a moment it looked as if she was going to disagree. Then Hotch leaned forwards. "Mam, I have observed Clearwater for over a week and I believe that she has the qualities and basic knowledge to do well in training." Strauss looked at him incredulously. "I'm not saying I'd accept her into my team tomorrow, mam," he covered quickly. "She needs the training. But she has an acceptable personality for the bureau, even if she can be a but arrogant and insufferably cheerful."

Reid saw Juliette's face split into a broad smile. Strauss was silent for a while. "Very well," she said finally, "I won't stop you from submitting your application. However, Clearwater, you should know that the way this investigation has been conducted is _not_ the way things work here. Dr. Reid," Reid looked up in surprise at being addressed. "I am warning you now that if you _ever_," she paused for dramatic effect, "invite a teenager into the bureau again, there will be consequences."

Reid tried to look humble. "Yes, mam."

She nodded sharply, standing up. "I think it's time we all went home," she said authoritatively, and left.

Juliette stood up awkwardly and cleared her throat. "Um… I just want to say thank you. All of you. For… for not sending me home. For defending me, Agent Hotchner, sir, and JJ. Agent Prentiss…" she sighed, looking embarrassed. "I'm sorry. For everything. This has been amazing. And… I'll be back. One day. And even Strauss won't be able to complain."

"I dunno," said JJ lightly. "Strauss is pretty good at complaining." Juliette giggled. Hotch stood up.

"Well, I'm not saying it's been amazing having you here, Clearwater," he said, "but I look forward to seeing you after you've got the proper…qualifications. Now – Strauss was right. Time to go home."

"Wait – sir, can I have Wednesday off, please?" Reid poured out hastily. Hotch frowned at him.

"Wednesday? Why?"

He felt himself blushing. "It's Juliette's eighteenth, sir," he said timidly. Hotch actually smiled.

"All right, Reid. Happy birthday for Wednesday, Clearwater." She thanked him. Reid watched as the BAU slowly left the briefing room. He took a deep breath.

"Um – Emily? Can I talk to you for a second?"

Juliette grinned as Prentiss voiced her assent. "I'll wait outside," she said.

Reid took another deep breath as he faced Prentiss, alone in the light, glassy room. He opened his mouth, to say what, he wasn't exactly sure. "I…" was as far as he got. His mouth opened and closed helplessly, but all that came out was a strangled, hesitant sound.

Emily Prentiss looked as though she was smothering a giggle. Prentiss wasn't the kind of person who giggled. "You want to talk about me… liking you." She sobered. "You want to say you don't share the feeling."

Reid let out the breath before he turned purple. "I'm sorry," he said slowly. "I'd say I know how you feel, but I've never really…"

Prentiss sighed."I know, Reid," she said. "I never really thought you would. I mean, I hoped, but…" Reid shrugged awkwardly. "Can we… you know… be like we were before? Friends?"

"Of course!" Reid was a little shocked that she'd ever thought they couldn't be. Prentiss relaxed and gave one of her rare smiles.

"Great," she said earnestly. "So I'll see you tomorrow?"

"Yeah," Reid replied. He turned and made for the door; the he stopped. "Oh, and Emily?"

"Yes, Reid?"

"My friends call me Spencer."

* * *

"So that went well, then?" Juliette asked lightly as she, Reid and Andrew made their way through the bureau building.

"I guess so," Reid said. "I made a bit of a fool of myself, though."

"Funny how _she_ likes _you_ and you don't feel the same, and yet _you're_ the one making a fool of yourself," she remarked absently. He didn't reply. She looked at him and he tried to look composed. She snorted. "I love you, Spencer," she said, punching him gently on the arm. "You're so cute."

"There is a point in life where one stops wanting to be called 'cute'," Reid said dignifiedly.

"Yeah," she replied, laughing, "and then there's the point in life where you realise that certain friends of yours are going to call you cute no matter what you do, and you resign yourself to it."

They reached the part of the street outside where Reid had parked his car. "Bye, then," he said gruffly. "Nice to see you again, Dr. Hurnen… sorry it had to be in such dire circumstances."

Andrew smiled weakly. "You too," he said. "And it's Drew."

Juliette threw her arms around him and hugged him fiercely. "Hey!" he protested. "Why are you hugging me like you're never going to see me again? I'll see you Wednesday, and probably call you before then to check you're all right."

"I'm fine," she said, releasing him from the hug but leaving one arm grasping his other arm and pulling him to her in camaraderie. "Spencer," she opened nostalgically, sweeping her other arm, palm out, in front of her as though to call the world to his attention, "I think this is the beginning of a beautiful friendship."

"_Casablanca,_" he muttered dryly, shaking her off. She laughed. "See you later."

"See you," she replied. He shook Andrew's hand and watched as they took the road leading back to the flat. At the corner of the road, before they disappeared from view, they stopped and turned back to wave. Reid lifted a hand in farewell, but it soon began to feel awkward, so he dropped it, turned, and walked away.

* * *

**A/N: The End! Haha! I completed a chapter fic, are you proud of me? You should be. The epilogue is cute but inconsequential, read it if you want a laugh and a warm, fuzzy feeling. Review! Or I will… um… well, I won't do anything with the idea for a sequel I had. Does anyone know if there's any copyright on using the Behavioral Analysis Unit as the center of a novel? 'Cause I could do that with this idea, I think. Anywhoosits, I hope you enjoyed my brief obsession and won't be quite as lost as I am now it's over!**

**-for you!**


	14. Epilogue

Jed Harris could think of a million places he'd rather be as he pushed his way through the people packed into the aisle of the train. Most of them involved having a busty blonde hanging off his arm, or, even better, off another part of his anatomy that would give the two of them considerably more pleasure. In fact, it was difficult for him to think of a place he _wouldn't_ rather be than on this packed train on the way to the stuffy office full of stuffy, boring people.

As he pushed his way to a part of the aisle that seemed slightly less crowded, Jed saw that there was an empty seat next to a bald man wearing enormous headphones. He looked around tentatively, wondering why no-one else had taken the seat, then quickly claimed it for his own.

There was a noise of outrage from behind him. "_Excuse _me!" A woman's voice said. Jed Harris turned around, frowning grumpily.

"What?" The girl who had spoken looked about eighteen, with long brown hair and dark eyes with a spark of something wild in them. She looked furious.

"What do you mean, _what?_ You are so _rude_!" Jed felt his eyebrows sky-rocket. What had he done to upset this girl? All he'd done was sit down.

"I'm sorry, I don't –"

"Don't apologise to _me!_ Apologise to that woman who was sitting there until you practically sat on her! You probably _would_ have sat on her if she hadn't moved! It was like you didn't even see her!" Jed was positively bewildered now; he was _sure _the seat had been empty before he sat down – no, he _knew_ it had been.

"This was an empty seat before I sat in it," he began, but the girl cut him off.

"Oh my God! I don't believe this! You sexist bastard! Just because she was obviously a lesbian –"

This, Jed thought, was out of line. "Hey," he said hotly, "I've got nothing against dykes –"

"Against _what?_ You –" the man sitting beside her, who looked to be in his mid-twenties, turned away from the window and laid a hand on her arm.

"Juliette, I'm sure she would have complained if she minded, dear, so why don't you just leave the poor man alone?"

"No, I will not leave him alone! Forget 'poor man', how about the poor _girl_ who he almost sat on! You're a bunch of sick homophobes, all of you!"

The man turned apologetically to Jed and gave him a helpless smile. "I'm sorry," he said. "I _told_ them she wasn't ready to come out today, but then the Human Rights Commission started breathing down our necks…"

Jed Harris was now thoroughly lost."Wait… 'come out'?"

The young man looked sadly at the girl, who had a large scar and a yellow bruise fading across one cheekbone and chapped, cut lips. "She's schizophrenic," he said, his hand rubbing hers gently. "She's been in the hospital for the past month. I told them she wasn't ready. I'm so sorry."

Jed looked back at the girl, who was now laughing at something he couldn't see, and a small twinge of pity twisted his stomach. "So…schizophrenia's, like, hallucinations and stuff, right?"

The man nodded. "That's the general idea," he said.

"So… so there _wasn't_ a lesbian girl on this seat before I sat down?" he clarified hesitantly.

"Of _course_ there was! How could you be so _biased_ that you didn't even _see_ her there? That's the stupidest thing I ever heard! I bet you've got nothing against gays!"

"Juliette…" the young man said placatingly.

"No! I can't believe you're defending this masochistic pig! Where is the _justice_ in this world?" She was now yelling so loud that most of the carriage had turned to look at them and Jed could feel himself turning red; he didn't need this, not today. It was just his luck that he had chosen to sit next to a schizophrenic girl on an outing from the loony bin.

"Look,' he said finally, "just say I did sit on this d – I mean, this lesbian chick. What do you want me to do about it?"The girl gave him an openly shocked look. "Apologise, of course," she said, as though it were obvious. "Get up, apologise to the poor girl, and offer her the seat back. I can't believe you need _me_ to tell you that."

Jed sighed. "Okay," he said. "Which one is she?"

The girl instantly pointed to a space in the aisle. "That one." Jed followed her finger with his eyes, but all he could see was an elderly woman with silver hair and a teenage boy in school uniform. He frowned.

"Which one?"

"That one there," the girl repeated. "The girl with short hair and rainbow suspenders." Jed scanned the entire aisle, but he couldn't see anyone wearing rainbow anything, let alone _suspenders_.

"I… I don't…"

"Oh my God! How can you just keep pretending she's not there! If you ignore a problem, it doesn't just do away!"

By now, Jed had had enough. He stood up. "Fine," he said. "I'll just leave, and the woman can have her seat back, how's that?" He would take a taxi to work, he thought to himself, just like he should have done to start with, when he first saw how crowded the train was.

"Well, that's a start," the girl was saying, "but you're going to have to let go of your pride some day, you know. You can't face all problems by running away from them!"

Jed stood up angrily as the train ground to a halt at the next station. He pushed his way back through the people and practically fell out of the train doors just before they struggled closed. As the train pulled away from the station, he caught a glimpse of the girl and the young man laughing together, and Jed Harris realized he'd been had.

Back on the train, Spencer Reid and Juliette Clearwater high-fived each other behind the empty seat amid manic whoops of laughter.


End file.
